'Why can't a shoe guide us?'

BANGALORE, INDIA: As Anirudh Sharma was sitting idle one day, he had a spark in his mind: "Why can't a shoe guide us?"

The 'serendipitous' idea was the seed for his Haptic shoes, Le Chal, an innovation that would change the way the visually challenged walked, forever. After all, "the orientation of the feet is towards the direction of walking."

In his quest to bring the concept to fruition, Sharma got some inputs from a couple of visually challenged, who, till then, were used to only conventional methods to aid their commute. "I wanted to make an intuitive design that involved the sense of touch based on pokes (mild vibrations). I didn't want to employ their sense of hearing," says Sharma, who was a bright student till the 10th grade, but became disinterested in structured classroom education later.

The core design was about getting Haptic (pertaining to sense of touch) feedback from the shoes of a user, who would spell out the destination on their GPS-based phone with the Le Chal app to be guided towards the destination through vibrations on the front, back, left or right side of a shoe. With the help of Google Maps to get directions, GPS for locational data and Bluetooth to establish communication between the phone and shoes, the user finds his way towards the destination.

While he initially made the schematics of the design open source, soon he felt it wasn't a good idea as others might not actually go about producing the shoes. He has already tested the prototype on about 25 blind people and says integration of the circuit in a shoe would cost anywhere between Rs. 1,500 and Rs. 2,000.

"I was always passionate about design; to convert a design into something tangible," he says. Unfortunately, he didn't have the requisite expertise in making shoes. "So, I wanted my Haptic design to be a generic add-on."

High on TR35

It is this project that won Sharma, 24, his first major recognition from the Technology Review's TR35 list, which recognizes outstanding innovators aged under 35 for their work in India that has the highest impact locally and globally. He has been awarded the 2012 Innovator of the Year.

On the award, he says, "It is to encourage young talents aged below 35, though age is no barrier for innovation. In the West, you have the Einstein Chair and the like to motivate talented youngsters. In India, we don't have any such platform and recognition. If you play music, it's cool, but if you do science, it's considered dry. Science needs to be glorified in the country."

Sharma feels that he might have been chosen for the award, probably because the technologies for the visually challenged segment is totally ignored.

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In the making: Augmented toiletry

Not resting on the laurels he won for his maiden project, he has already got the germ of an idea to work on augmented toiletry. "It will enable day-to-day diagnosis through urine and fecal samples and will basically keep a tab on your health parameters. We are working on the idea and would bring it out once the shoe (which is in prototype stage undergoing tests currently) is done," explains Sharma.

His new venture, Ducere Technologies, which he co-founded with Krispian Lawrence, focuses on such promoting and realizing such concepts.

It's besides his research consultant job at Hewlett-Packard Labs, in which he primarily works on immersive interaction, multimodal technologies and tangibles. And Sharma views his outside research activities as an extension of his work.

"My mentor, Sriganesh Madhvanath, has been a great inspiration and guide to me. As of now, I am focusing on cool interface, including virtual reality, and multimodal sensors."

'Foster, support innovation'

As for funding his projects, he says that he was fortunate to have got the right people to work with, though without a capitalist background. "Government needs to extend its help to tech entrepreneurs. We are proud of iPhone and Samsung, but they are not our own. For that to happen, IT companies should also invest in ideas and efforts," explains Sharma.

The educational system in India, he feels, is very rigid and could be lax. "It's a narrow channel, where creativity dies. One has to be a rebel to be innovative in this set-up."

The young innovator is also concerned by lack of culmination of interdisciplinary activities, such as that of pure sciences and pure tech. "There are exciting avenues for India to work on, such as tangible user interface, which holds out a great potential. Integration of physical and digital interfaces should also happen."

Sharma, who admires and tries to learn from Richard Stallman, Steve Jobs and Osho, has this to say for young innovators: Don't be afraid to experiment. Think of new ideas. Don't let your creativity die; just try and execute it, come what may.