Innovations for Defence Excellence (iDEX) scheme

Context

The Ministry of Defence is seeking to expand the scope of its flagship Innovations for Defence Excellence (iDEX) scheme and has sought additional funds from the Finance Ministry to keep it going.

About iDEX

The iDEX (Innovations For Defence Excellence) is a well-conceived scheme of the Ministry’s Department of Defence.
The iDEX initiative was launched in April 2018.
It aims to achieve self-reliance and foster innovation and technology development in defence and aerospace by engaging industries including MSMEs, start-ups, individual innovators, R&D institutes and academia.
ADITI Scheme: Earlier this year, the Defence Minister launched another initiative — the Acing Development of Innovative Technologies with iDEX (ADITI) scheme — to promote innovations in critical and strategic defence technologies under which start-ups are eligible to receive grant-in-aid of up to Rs 25 crore for their research, development and innovation endeavours in defence technology.
- The ADITI scheme worth Rs 750 crore for the period 2023-24 to 2025-26 falls under the iDEX framework and aims to develop about 30 deep-tech critical and strategic technologies in a proposed timeframe.

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