Thiru. A. Raja, Hon'ble Minister of Communications & Information Technology, Government of India laid the foundation stone for the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing's (C-DAC) new Innovation Centre at the Anna University campus, Chennai today.

C-DAC established its Chennai centre in the year 2002 and expects to augment its strengths with this new facility that will be spread over 35,000 sq ft and seat around 150 to 200 Engineers. C-DAC is a premier scientific society of the Department of Information Technology (DIT), Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MC&IT), Government of India undertaking research and development in IT and electronics.

One of the major objectives of C-DAC, Chennai is to enhance and invigorate research competencies in emerging areas of Information Technology in the country. To achieve this goal, C-DAC Chennai is currently focusing on contemporary and emerging topics of research and technology including Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) through National Resource Centre for FOSS (NRC-FOSS), Ubiquitous or Pervasive Computing and Grid Computing. It also houses the Advanced Computing Training School of C-DAC to address the growing need for skilled manpower from the IT industry.

C-DAC, Chennai and AU-KBC Research Centre, Anna University, together set up the National Resource Centre for Free and Open Source Software (NRC-FOSS) in 2005. The main aim of NRC-FOSS was to come up with a localized Indian GNU/Linux distribution and help bridge the digital divide in India. Further, NRC-FOSS aims at encouraging and promoting the development of applications under FOSS & SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) framework in the areas of school education, SMEs and the e-governance domain.

One of main deliverable of NRCFOSS so far has been Bharat Operating Systems and Solutions (BOSS). BOSS is a GNU/Linux distribution developed by C-DAC for enhancing the use of Free/Open Source Software throughout India. Targeting the Indian user, it is designed as a user-friendly Desktop environment coupled with Indian language support and other packages that are highly relevant for use in the government domain. Bharat Operating System Solutions (BOSS) Server Entry level Edition has also since been released early this year.

The presence of the Innovation Centre at the campus of prestigious Anna University campus is expected to provide a strong and vibrant innovation ecosystem, enhance partnership in research initiatives and contribute to growing Indian market with new technology.

Speaking on the occasion, Thiru A. Raja, Honourable Minister of Communications & Information Technology, said, "It gives me immense pleasure to be here on this occasion and lay the foundation stone for C-DAC’s new Innovation Centre at Chennai. While Indian IT industry is growing at a brisk pace, R&D is important to ensure its long-term competitiveness Indian domestic market needs to benefit from innovation and latest technologies in the field and address the special applications and needs of our country at affordable price point. C-DAC has done commendably well in addressing these expectations and enabling India to progress towards technological advancement. Their work is well embedded in the policies and interventions of the government. The C-DAC Innovation Centre, Chennai coming up in this Campus of Anna University has a unique opportunity to occupy a pride of place in this knowledge era."

Other dignitaries who spoke on occasion were Thiru. D Viswanathan, Vice-Chancellor, Anna University, Thiru M. Madhavan Nambiar, Special Secretary, Department of Information Technology, Government of India and Thiru S. Ramakrishnan, Former Director General, C-DAC. Faculty and Students of Anna University, and Eminent members from academia, research and industry and Scientists from C-DAC attended the function.

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