Tata Steel Advanced Materials Research Centre (TSAMRC), in collaboration with the Entrepreneurship Cell, IIT Madras is hosting a competition ‘Tata Steel MaterialNEXT’ that offers a chance to the budding researcher, technology developer and enthusiasts in the field of advanced materials, to propose, produce and present their solution model to the existing industrial challenges and breakthrough innovations to experts.

‘Tata Steel MaterialNEXT’ evolves through a three-phase route with interactive mentoring sessions by the industry specialists and professors who are working in this field, at each stage. Finally, the top three solutions and teams get recognized and rewarded. Registration for ‘Tata Steel MaterialNEXT’ is open till January 12, 2019.

With the growing popularity of graphene and other advanced nanomaterials around the world, it is important to come up with solutions to the industrial problems that occur during manufacturing and commercialization, and acknowledge the fact that for the potential technologies which are at their early development stages, there is a lot to be figured out especially in the R&D stage.

At Tata Steel, pursuing research in advanced materials is an active process. The work in the area of Nanotechnology started almost a decade ago. The Company started the Graphene Initiative in 2016 with the opening of the Graphene Centre in Jamshedpur. The objective was to identify applications and establish successful upscaling models and discover potential markets.

Two Tata Steel Advanced Materials Research Centers have been established, one at Chennai in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IITM), and the other at Bengaluru, in collaboration with the Center for Nano and Soft Matter Sciences (CeNS). The objective of these centers is to work closely with academia and other centres of expertise to strengthen the portfolio of advanced materials research and its applications, including Graphene.

Tata Steel’s sustainable growth aspirations are driven by innovation, guided by values and supported by the efforts towards continuous improvements in the processes, building efficiencies and adding value to the products & solutions while meeting varied requirements.

Participants selected in phase #1 of ‘Tata Steel MaterialNEXT’ will be invited for a one-on-one interaction with assigned mentors during a conference to be held on January 19, 2019. In the second phase, teams will be given eight weeks to work on their proposals and present their solutions in a competitive evaluation by panels of eminent judges on March 16, 2019.  The top five teams selected at the end of phase two will move to the third and final phase - the grand finale, that will be held on April 13, 2019.

The competition starts with registration wherein participants in teams of 2 to 3 must submit their proposals. These will be evaluated by the experts as per certain criteria.

About Tata Steel MaterialNEXT
‘Tata Steel MaterialNEXT’ hosted by Tata Steel Advanced Materials Research Centre in collaboration with IIT Madras is a chance for the budding researcher, technology developer and enthusiasts in this field to propose, produce and present their breakthrough innovation and solution model for existing industrial challenges to experts.

For more details, please visit: https://bit.ly/2rTj5Z6

About Tata Steel                  
Tata Steel Group is among the top global steel companies with an annual crude steel capacity of 27.5 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) as on March 31, 2018. It is one of the world's most geographically diversified steel producers, with operations and commercial presence across the world. The Group recorded a consolidated turnover of US $20.41 billion (INR 133,016 crore) in FY18. Tata Steel Group is spread across five continents with an employee base of over 65,000. Tata Steel retained Industry Leader position in FY18 and ranked second overall in the DJSI assessment, 2017. The Company has been recognised as the Climate Disclosure Leader in ‘Steel category’ by CDP (2017). Besides being a member of the World Steel Climate Action Programme, Tata Steel was felicitated with several awards including the Prime Minister’s Trophy for the best performing integrated steel plant for 2014-15 and 2015-16, Best Risk Management by CNBC TV18 (2018) and ‘Corporate Strategy Award’ by Mint (2018). The Company also received the ‘Most Ethical Company’ award from Ethisphere Institute for the sixth time (2018), Steel Sustainability Champions (2017) by the World Steel Association, Dun & Bradstreet Corporate Awards (2017 & 2018), Golden Peacock HR Excellence Award by Institute of Directors (2017) as well as 'Asia's Best Integrated Report' award by the Asia Sustainability Reporting Awards (2017), among several others.

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Statements in this press release describing the Company’s performance may be “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of applicable securities laws and regulations. Actual results may differ materially from those directly or indirectly expressed, inferred or implied. Important factors that could make a difference to the Company’s operations include, among others, economic conditions affecting demand/ supply and price conditions in the domestic and overseas markets in which the Company operates, changes in or due to the environment, Government regulations, laws, statutes, judicial pronouncements and/ or other incidental factors.