A tripartite agreement was signed between Numaligarh Refinery Ltd(NRL), Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Guwahati and Vigitrics Private Limited, a startup selected through NRL’s flagship startup funding initiative iDEATION, to fund incubation activities of the startup for two years at IIT Guwahati’s Technology Incubation Centre (TIC). The agreement was signed by Senior Chief General Manager (Corporate affairs) NRL, Nikunja Borthakur, Dean (Industrial Interactions  & Special Initiatives) IIT Guwahati, Prof. G. Krishnamoorthy and Director, Vigitrics, Pharvesh Salman Choudhary in presence of Director, IIT Guwahati Dr. T.G. Sitharam, other officials of NRL, IIT Guwahati and Vigitrics Private Ltd at IIT Guwahati on 17^th March 2021.   

Vigitrics shall develop an “Intelligent Drowsiness Detection System”  for vehicle drivers. The project aims to build a low-cost non-intrusive system to determine the drowsiness of the driver and to alarm the driver if drowsiness is detected. The system shall incorporate two different methods of drowsiness detection reducing the risk of a false drowsiness assessment and shall consist of physiological sensors as well as cameras backed by suitable machine learning algorithm for data analysis.

The NRL has launched iDEATION in 2017 to lend wings to the dreams and ideas of entrepreneurs from the North-East by selecting promising ideas and assisting them to grow. Out of Rs 10 crores earmarked for startup funding, about Rs 5.5 crores has already been allocated across 23 startups.