Infosys will invest an additional Rs 7.2 crores in ideaForge by year end

IT services major Infosys on Thursday released the details of its USD 1 million in ideaForge Technology. Infosys had, in 2016, invented in the UAV systems manufacturing company for 20% minority stake. The startup focuses on the production of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles or UAV solutions (drones).

Infosys said in a regulatory filing that the company has agreed with ideaForge Technology; to invest an additional $ 1 million (earlier, the company had invested $ 1.5 million in 2016) taking the cumulative investment to $ 2.5 million as of date, subject to necessary closing conditions. The company aims to utilize this fund on R&D, sales, marketing, business development and working capital needs. Further, the transaction will take place in the fourth quarter of FY21.

A wide spectrum of organisations are increasingly using ideaForge's UAV systems, the company said. “Several customers of Infosys have also embraced UAV systems as they digitalise rapidly,” it further added.

About ideaForge

A team of 4 IIT Bombay alumni, Ankit Mehta, Rahul Singh, Ashish Bhat and Vipul Joshi founded the startup in 2007. Based out of Mumbai, ideaForge produces rugged and high-precision UAV systems. Major uses of the system include inspection, surveillance and mapping with integrated vertical solutions across defence, homeland security, mining, construction, agriculture, energy and utilities.

Currently, the organization has also deployed over 1000 systems and has trained over 1400 pilots in services including Indian Army, Navy, Air-Force, all CAPFs (CRPF, BSF, NSG, etc), State Police Forces, Indian Railways, TAFE, NTPC, DRDO, L&T and many more. Further, less than a month ago, the startup signed a $20 million contract with the Indian Army. The contract of supplying a high-altitude variant of ideaForge’s SWITCH UAV spans for a period of 1 year. The Indian Army also uses ideaForge's flagship product NETRA.

(Note: CiOL has added additional background information to this PTI copy for context)