Three Social-minded Indian Hardware Inventors Named the Grand Prize Winner of ASME Innovation Showcase

Transformative inventions are something that happens when ideas of the people who have taken the road less travelled work out. These inventions later on impact the lives of the next generation in a great deal. This week, three social-minded Indian hardware inventors were named as the regional Grand Prize winners of the prestigious 2018 ASME Innovation Showcase. Out of the eight finalists who travelled to Bengaluru, these three were selected to compete for a share of $500,000 in awards and technical support to bring in their prototypes to the people in need.

Charla K. Wise, President, ASME, says, “The extraordinary inventions put forward by Annie by Thinkerbell Labs, Brün CG and Sparsh will make it possible for doctors and teachers to do more to help their patients and students, respectively, live better, more fulfilling lives. Their display of creativity and ingenuity, and that of their peers, fully embodies the spirit of the ISHOW and exemplifies the potential of tomorrow’s engineering problem-solvers and social entrepreneurs.”

The regional Grand Prize winners include Annie by ThinkerBell Labs, Brun CG and Sparsh by Yostra Labs and their brilliance was vastly impressed by the star studded panel of judges which included the representatives from Tesla, Villgro Innovations, BEMPU, Henkel India, Ankur Capital, Imaginarium, Osteo3d and Design Directions. ThinkerBell Labs’ Annie is an affordable audio-tactile device that runs on a Raspberry Pi and it consists of hardware components such as refreshable braille display, a digital braille slate and a perkins-style braille keyboard. Next up is Brun CG, a revolutionary new labor detection tool with a technology that makes it possible to communicate with clinicians from a distant area. It monitors vital signs and fetal data of the patients and send it across to analyse. Yostra Labs’ Sparsh is a hand-held medical device which can screen diabetic patients for symptoms of peripheral neuropathy, the permanent damage to nerves in the feet.

Headquartered at New York City, ASME is a professional association in its own words “promotes the art, science, and practice of multidisciplinary engineering and allied sciences around the globe.” Founded in 1880, ASME has over 130,000 members worldwide and it conducts one of the world’s largest technical publishing operations.

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