New Delhi: India must complement its strong engineering education with a “maker mindset” to achieve its ambitions of becoming a global manufacturing and technology leader, according to Maker Bhavan Foundation (MBF).
Speaking after the seventh edition of InventX, organised by MBF in collaboration with IIT Gandhinagar and IIT Jammu, CEO Gautam Khanna said engineering graduates are well-equipped with technical knowledge but need greater exposure to solving real-world problems through hands-on innovation.
“Engineering education has world-class technical depth. What needs strengthening is the ability to identify problems, build solutions, iterate through failure and innovate,” Khanna said.
This shift, Khanna said, also demands a change in how engineering is taught. “You cannot build a maker mindset with a prescriptive syllabus. It needs mentoring and coaching, where faculty guide students instead of providing solutions, in a space built for hands-on work.”
InventX is a six-week residential programme that enables engineering students to develop patent-worthy prototypes by working on real-world challenges. Since its inception, participants have filed over 120 provisional patents, with around 10% of the innovations progressing to incubation for further development.
What sets the programme apart, according to MBF, is that patenting is built into the process. Every team works toward a provisional patent filing as a core deliverable, which means prototypes need to move beyond an “interesting idea” into something with demonstrated novelty and defensible IP. “A patent filing forces a level of rigor that a demo day doesn’t,” Khanna said. “It requires prior art search, technical documentation, and proof that this hasn’t been done before. That discipline is what turns a classroom project into a true invention.”
With more than 1,000 applications for just 60 seats this year, MBF plans to expand the programme by partnering with two more institutions for the 2027 cohort. The Foundation also said it is in discussions with government stakeholders to scale its innovation model without compromising the programme’s immersive format.
Beyond InventX, MBF is expanding its network of Tinkerers’ Labs, now present across more than 30 campuses, to promote experiential learning and foster a culture of maker-led innovation among engineering students.
“InventX is the proof, not the destination. Our long-term goal is to make the maker mindset an integral part of engineering education across India,” Khanna said.
