IIT-M launches online start-up course in AI

The start-up — One Fourth Labs was launched in collaboration with Small and Medium Enterprises (SME). It was incubated by IIT Madras, through its online school ‘PadhAI’ that offers affordable courses specific to India on AI.

Every year, the top scorer from the online school would be invited for a ‘summer garage,’ an AI residency programme at IIT Madras research park.

One of the founder of the start-up, Dr Mitesh Khapra said, “AI is tough. It requires both mathematical insight and hands-on experience. PadhAI offers a hands-on course on ‘Deep Learning’ which is the most successful sub-field of AI,” he affirmed.

He said, “To make AI have a better reach, minimal prerequisites are expected. The fees structure is significantly lower than other universities and private organisations.”

“There are several courses on AI available online and through universities. Most of these courses are not designed by keeping Indian students in mind and are also highly-priced,” said Dr Pratyush Kumar, the other founder of the start-up.

The four-month course will begin on February 1, 2019. It will offer monthly contests and a capstone challenge that trains participants to build an app that works like Google Lens for a few Indian languages.

In order to solve the complex capstone challenge, simplified explanations and interactive tools will be available. Participants would receive scores based on their performance on these contents and certificates would be provided on successful completion of the course. The fee of the course has been fixed at Rs 1,000 per student.