Doha: The Indian Business & Professionals Council (IBPC Qatar) has launched its ‘Meet the Innovator’ Series recently with the inaugural virtual meeting focusing on “Innovative and Creative Ideas”. With more than 100 IBPC members and high school students in attendance via Zoom, and with the topic “Innovation to keep you young and engaged”, the event is the first in the Meet the Innovator Series, which was introduced by IBPC Qatar President Jaffer Us Sadiq.
During the event, ‘Star of the Show’ Dr. Mylswamy Annadurai, who is also Vice-President of Tamil Nadu State Council for Science & Technology, spoke about various innovative ideas during his journey in aerospace engineering and satellite communications. Dr. Annadurai is the Chairman of National Design and Research Forum (NDRF) India, which has successfully made two major contributions such as Chandrayan-1 and Mangalyan to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
Dr. Annadurai was also the Project Director of India’s first mission to Mars, which reached the planet on September 24, 2014 completing its 300-day journey. India has to date launched 342 foreign satellites from 34 countries on a commercial basis using PSLV. The country has also successfully launched 1,743 smallsats in the year 2021 alone, and has trained 33 non-space countries on small satellite technology.
Dr. Annadurai encouraged young budding engineers in the audience to study Space Engineering due to the huge demand in Space Commerce. In 2020, global space-related activities generated $447bn. The Indian Space industry was valued at $7bn in 2019 and aims to grow to $50bn by 2024. India is aiming for 10 percent of the global space market by 2030. IBPC Vice-President Abdul Sathar, who hosted the meeting, spoke about IBPC’s innovative initiatives on introducing Series of talks aimed at sharing knowledge and benefiting the community as part of its CSR activities.
