NXP 'Anubhav' University program launches 'Automotive Center Of Excellence' at I2IT

PUNE, INDIA: NXP Semiconductors N.V. has inaugurated the Automotive Centre of Excellence (ACE) in Pune in association with the International Institute of Information Technology (I 2 IT).

Located at I 2 IT Pune Campus, this Center of Excellence will provide unique infrastructure and collaboration of the Industry and academia. The center will foster the innovation in the field of automotive electronics and would provide students, faculties, automotive Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), automotive sub-assembly suppliers and industries in the region with expert technical support for product development and research activities to address market demands.

In January 2011, NXP had announced an elaborate initiative called NXP ‘Anubhav’ to set up state-of-the-art labs at top engineering institutes in India and the Automotive Center of Excellence is a step in the direction. This is fifth lab as part of a plan to setup 20 labs across India under NXP “Anubhav” program.

“Pune has emerged as an important automotive hub in the country and is home to excellent academic institutions on embedded systems. By setting up the first ever Automotive Centre of Excellence in the country for university students, we hope to foster automotive research in the Pune metropolitan area. We want to give I2IT students a chance to work closely with customers and OEMs to help them innovate and address market trends at same time,” said Drue Freeman, VP, Global Sales and Marketing, Automotive Business, NXP Semiconductors.

“We are especially happy to partner with I 2 IT for this initiative, as it’s one of the few institutes in India which has an exclusive curriculum dedicated for automotive engineering.”

Speaking on the association with NXP, Padmashree Dr. Vijay Bhatkar, Chief Mentor at I 2 IT said: “As a world-class institute, we pride ourselves on giving our students opportunities to work closely with industry. We plan to work with some of the leading companies to allow our students to work on live projects related to automotive domain. We are confident that our association with a leading semiconductors company like NXP will tremendously benefit our students and faculty, specializing in this domain and also create unique opportunity for Industry Institute collaboration.”

NXP and I 2 IT have jointly decided to establish ‘Automotive Centre of Excellence’ (ACE). The center will be used for teaching and working on industry projects in the fields of High Performance Mixed Signal (HPMS) solutions for application in automotive electronics and other industrial domains. ACE at I2IT will foster talent, facilitate technology absorption, knowledge generation and focus in chosen domain to develop application and solution for specific markets like India.

Through the Centre, NXP will provide electronic product development facilities for local OEMs and other customers in the region. The ACE will have tools, software, and hardware facilities for specialised automotive electronics domains such as Infotainment, Telematics, Car Access and Immobilisers, In-Vehicle-Networking (IVN), Sensors, and General Purpose semiconductor devices.

ACE will also be used to conduct seminars, technology trainings & hands-on workshops in the campus by NXP, I 2 IT and industry experts. NXP will work closely with the I 2 IT to incorporate NXP technology into the academic curriculum to familiarize students & faculty with NXP‘s HPMS product portfolio.