iNurture plans Rs 15-cr campus in Bangalore

iNurture Education Solutions, a Bangalore-based courseware developer, which entered the market with a BSc degree in animation in 2005, is planning to start a Masters in food systems biotechnology programme by January 2012.

“Towards this, we are in the process of building our own space in Bangalore at an investment of between Rs 10 crore and Rs 15 crore. We are currently working with the Karnataka government for the campus and our goal is to have it in place by November 2011,” said Nikhil N Kapur, chief operating officer of iNurture.

Since 2005, iNurture had grown to creating a Masters in science (animation), mobile applications and remote infrastructure management (RIM) services, which are currently being delivered by the company at Gujarat University.

Speaking to Business Standard at the two-day Nasscom Animation and Gaming Conclave 2010, which concluded here on Saturday, Kapur said unresearched numbers put the current demand for food biotechnology experts at 300 and the country was able to fulfil the requirement by just 50 seats a year.

“In the first year, we will not accept more than 50 students for the Masters in food systems biotechnology programme. However, in Year-II, we will increase the student intake to 100 and to 150 in the next,” he said.

The programme, to be offered in partnership with the University of Massachusetts, will include a fully-paid scholarship for a PhD from the varsity. “Fee structure for the programme is currently being worked out,” Kapur added.

Online animation software platform
Kapur said Digital-Tutors, an online animation software learning platform that the company had launched 45 days ago, had started gaining acceptance worldwide with clients like Pixar Animation Studios, Nickelodeon, Mercedes-Benz, Harvard and Stanford universities, Nasa and IIT-Mumbai already using it.

Digital-Tutors offers more than 13,000 online animation and VFX tutorial videos for over 33 software applications including Adobe Illustrator, 3Ds Max, Maya, Flash and Dreamweaver. The annual subscription, including a certification for Digital-Tutors is Rs 12,500.

“Our goal now is to make the product available to students in India. Currently, there are more than 1,000 users for the service worldwide, including 280 from India. We would like to grow the Indian user base to 2,500 in the next one year. Besides, we are in the process of taking the number of software platforms to 45, from the current 33, during the same time frame,” Kapur said.