Rourkela: They left their jobs before delving deep into the challenging world of startups with a resolve to become entrepreneurs. Today the duo has mastered robotics and brought pride for Odisha by producing unmanned underwater robots.
The spotlight is now on Debendra Pradhan and Biswajit Swain after they made their pitch on Shark Tank India earlier this month.
They have made two robots christened as ‘Jaladuta’ and ‘Jalasimha’. While ‘Jaladuta’ can go up to 50 metre underwater, the other one, ‘Jalasimha’, has a range up to 500-600 metre.
“Both can look underwater for any possible damages or threats to structures like bridges and dams and show their condition. Besides, the two robots can be very useful for defence purposes, for which the Indian Navy is also with us,” said Debendra. However, they declined to say anything more citing security reasons. At present they have reputed clients like Indian Navy, Indian Railways, SAIL, Tata Steel, Aditya Birla and others.
The duo passed out from NIT Rourkela in 2017 and joined the corporate world. However, their restive minds were not satisfied with their jobs. “We did our mechanical engineering with specialisation in mechatronics and automation. But, somehow we were not happy with what we were doing so we decided to start our own startup, hence Coratia Technology,” said Debendra. Coratia is a combination of core and Asia hence the interesting combination, he added.
The duo joined the Foundation of Technology and Business Incubation (FTBI) of NIT Rourkela, the cradle for startups in the ace institute. There they got the support of the research experts, especially the faculties who were more than eager to join them as a helping hand.
“This was our college project and today we have made it into a company,” said Debendra. They started with initial seed money of `1 lakh and now they have garnered `80 lakh investment, for one per cent of their equity from CEO and founder of OYO Rooms Ritesh Agarwal, who is from Odisha’s Rayagada and a shark in the startup show Shark Tank India.
“The experience was nice and we will receive the fund as soon as the documentation process is over. The best part is they did not bargain with us at all,” informed Biswajit.
Presently, they are a team of 14 students and have won several awards and accolades for their project. The team also had an opportunity to showcase their robots to Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.
Soon, branches will come up at Bangalore and also at Bhubaneswar, they said. “But our main R&D will be here in Rourkela and we will then look where we will set up our business office,” informed Debendra. Both said it would be difficult to leave NIT Rourkela because, the project is linked to academics and research and our great professors are involved in it. So, we cannot leave this place.”
By Rajesh Mohanty, OP
