The Bengaluru Science and Technology (BeST) cluster was launched at a plenary session on the first day of the Bengaluru Tech Summit, 2022, by Principal Scientific Adviser (PSA) Prof. Ajay Sood, along with Prof. G. Padmanabhan, ex. Director of Indian Institute of Science (IISC) and S Gopalakrishnan, Co-founder, Infosys.
The BeST cluster looks to be a platform enabling active collaboration for the entire Research and Development (R&D ) ecosystem in Bangalore cutting across disciplines and mandates but retaining their individual autonomy, Prof. Sood explained. He anticipates that the Bangalore cluster will succeed and pave the path for future success.
The BeST cluster has identified health and wellness, urban life, and futuristic technologies as its core sectors. Accordingly, it has set up teams to work on areas of digital health, precision agriculture, urban transportation, monsoon and climate change, quantum technologies, active matter, and robotics and jet engines.
It will also focus on central government’s One Health mission.
The conceptualisation of the BeST cluster is a collaborative effort of more than 50 organisations and was coordinated by the IISc in partnership with the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP).
“Bangalore is a city of science, innovation and opportunity. The BeST cluster launch could be a landmark moment for Science and Technology in India and possibly the world,” Dr Taslimarif Saiyed, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of C-CAMP, said in a statement. “We aim to bring together stakeholders with shared ecosystems, identify and address problems first with locally relevant solutions, but also scale-up nationally and internationally by building global competitiveness.”
The BeST is the latest in a set of Office of the PSA supported clusters. The earlier science and technology clusters have been set up in Pune, Jodhpur, Delhi-NCR, Bhubaneswar and Hyderabad.
