After the successful completion of Yantra 7.0, RAN (Robotics Association of Nepal) is back again with another innovative event with the platform to learn and exchange knowledge in the field of Science, Technology, and Robotics. This year RAN and the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology will be jointly organizing this event making it bigger and better than the previous one.
The History of Yantra
Yantra was first initiated by the Robotics Association of Nepal in 2012 as a National Robotics competition, but over the years the event has taken a unique shape- an Art, Science, and Tech Festival. Each year RAN initiates new things, like in 2016 to promote women’s participation in the technical field, they started “Miss-Tech: By women, for women.” Similarly, as a part of Yantra different National and International Robotics Competition is being organized annually for the last 6 years.
And now, this platform is open for collaboration among artists, engineers, entrepreneurs, tech enthusiasts all over Nepal to promote, educate, and get more Nepali to explore the field of robotics, electronics, automation, and makers.
Yantra 8.0
So, what is new this year for Yantra 8.0?
Set to be held between January 24th to February 5th, Yantra 8.0 is yet another initiation of the Robotics Association of Nepal to build an ecosystem of the Artificial Intelligence community here in Nepal. With the theme “Robotics and AI for Sustainable Development” and the tagline “Science, Technology, and Innovation, Socio-economic Transformation”, this event features International Robotics competitions, Robo-Business Cup, Yantra Preparatory workshops, Yantra Learning, Yantra Kids, and other multidisciplinary programs. With each year, this Science, Tech, and Entrepreneurship Festival is getting bigger and better and this time, it also focuses on Global and local challenges such as Climate Change, Good Governance, and Sustainable Development goals taking the robotics community to a different level.
Objectives of Yantra 8.0:
With the target of reaching 15000 youths from all over Nepal through direct outreach and 10 million through indirect outreach, this year Yantra 8.0 aims in generating Nepalese young robotics and automation manpower who can compete globally. Other objectives for this festival include:
- Maximizing the capacity in National Production by implementing and developing science, technology, and innovation via Robotics and Automation.
- Based on the emerging science, technologies, and innovation, Yantra 8.0 focuses on empowering the economic growth of youth especially young robotics and tech enthusiasts providing them International exposure to showcase their talent.
- Plan to enhance Robotics and AI as a problem-solving tool
Goals of Yantra 8.0:
With Yantra 8.0, RAN offers technical training and workshops and provides youth the human experience to learn about robotics.
- Guide the tech enthusiasts, Robotics and Automation Engineers, and IT professionals so that they can grow and come up with their own product-solving approaches
- Improve qualitative and quantitative lead in the Robotics innovation in Nepal
- Promote the modern technologies of innovation for Agriculture, health, manufacturing, tourism, etc.
Who can participate?
This event is highly focused on the School level and high-level students like Engineering students, IT Professionals for the future betterment in the Robotics Industry in Nepal.
All those science, tech, and engineering students who believe their ideas can contribute to the robotics world can participate in this festival.
Age group: 8-30 years
Major programs of Yantra 8.0 Science, Tech and Entrepreneurship Festival 2020
- International Robotics Competition
The robotics competition has three major categories:
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- Yantra Automatic Akhada
In this competition, the team has to build a fully autonomous robot that should be able to travel and solve a maze to find five hidden hazard signs, a human and an animal using image processing with QR code messages.
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- Yantra Manual Akhada
Yantra Manual Akhada: Fight Against Intruder is a competition introduced with the aim of creating robots that can support in mitigating the problems of natural disasters like earthquakes, landslides, floods, etc., and searching for the intruder who is causing the destruction.
This is an open competition where the team has to build robots capable of destroying/destructing other robots using any method within the game boundary. Also, the created robot must be able to withstand the destruction caused by other robots.
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- Yantra National league
Yantra National League- Football for Peace is a competition that focuses on transferring technology knowledge as well as creating a symbolic friendly environment in the world through Robot Football. This is an open robot football competition for all age groups and mainly focused on the students of Bachelor’s level and high school.
- Robo-Business Cup
Robo Business Cup is a national event focused on creating a platform for the next steps for innovative and creative Science and Technology communities working in the field of Robotics empowering robot engineers or start-ups to start their business in this innovative world. This platform focuses on creating an environment that promotes prototype/product development addressing the challenges that exist in the nation through local innovation.
The winner of this cup will be entitled “Most Promising Robot Entrepreneur” and the top 2 winners will get a prize worth Rs.2 lakh along with various training sponsorship and 3 months of product incubation.
- Yantra Learning
Yantra Learning is the very first national-level machine learning competition in Nepal. Robotics Association of Nepal initiated this to build an ecosystem of the Artificial Intelligence community here in Nepal.
In this event, 2 types of challenges are included. The first one is a thematic challenge where the participant needs to develop a solution to any problem in the field of Agriculture, Medical and Education. The other one is an open challenge for participants where they can present a solution of their own with no restriction to develop the solution.
- Yantra School
Yantra School is a Robotics workshop that specifically focuses on teens and kids. The main aim of this project is to provide knowledge on design thinking, prototyping, tinkering, electronics components, coding, etc. to the school students in all the provinces of Nepal. This workshop encourages the school-level students to learn about the multidimensional field of Robotics and its playful nature.
The final competition will be organized based on the prototype they have made during the workshop and the training session.
- Yantra Incubation
The Robo-Business Cup and Yantra Learning winners will be provided with Yantra Incubation to find solutions for the local problems and come up with their own problem-solving approaches. The main focus will be targeted on developing modern technologies for Agricultural, Health, Tourism, Industry, Manufacturing, and Smart cities. At least 3 projects will go through Yantra Incubation for the next 12 months.
- Mini-Yantra Events
As a part of the festival, various mini-yantra events and workshops are being held at different places focusing on different provinces.
- Yantra East – Dharan (covering province no 1 and 2)
- Yantra 8.0 Science, Tech Entrepreneurship Festival – Kathmandu (Province 3)
- Yantra 8.0 West- Pokhara (Province 4 and 5)
- Yantra Far West- Dhangadi (Province 6 and 7)
So, what are you waiting for Register now!
Yantra Opening and Closing events
The Opening will include stakeholders from different Governmental and Non-governmental sectors, Public and Private sector Leaders, Development Agencies sharing their thoughts through panel discussion and presentation about how we can connect these technologies as a modern tool to develop all the Infrastructure and Manufacturing sector through sustainable development. And the closing of this event focuses on providing Entrepreneurship as the best possible feasible solution for the effective implementation of STI policy and achieving the SDGs as well.
So, Yantra 8.0 is going to become one of the most awaited and important events in Nepal and is a must-go event for all the tech-people, startups, entrepreneurs, and most importantly to those who see their future in robotics.