Turn Your Hardware Ideas Into Real-world Products

Join the Program
Grant Per Team
Up to ₹5 Lakh
Grant Pool
₹3 Cr
Stages
8
Demo Day
April 2027

The ladder

Earn Your Way to a Real Product

An open notebook with hand-drawn circuit sketches and a sense, decide, act flow, beside a starter kit of a microcontroller, an ultrasonic sensor, LEDs and resistors

01 / 08 · Pre-entry

Explorer

Learn the basics

Learn Applied IoT, clear assessments, solo.

Time
4–6 weeks indicative
Grant
—
A team sketching a soil-sensor concept on paper, with sticky notes and a photo of dry farmland

02 / 08 · Foundation

TRL 1–2

Idea

Form a team of 3–5, pick a real problem and submit a proposal that passes the AI-scored evaluation and human critic.

Time
4–6 weeks indicative
Grant
—
A laptop showing a 3D CAD model of the sensor enclosure, exploded, beside its thermal simulation

03 / 08 · Foundation

TRL 3

Model

Deep dive and learn hardware concepts, and build a working simulation, 3D model and software that prove the idea can work.

Time
6–10 weeks indicative
Grant
—
A breadboard prototype with a soil probe, microcontroller and small display, being tested with a multimeter

04 / 08 · Foundation

TRL 4

Prototype

A breadboard prototype that closes the sense–decide–act loop, tested in the lab.

Time
2–3 months indicative
Grant
₹30K
The hand-soldered circuit in an open enclosure on farm soil at dusk, wired to its soil probe

05 / 08 · Execution

TRL 5

Proof of concept

Validated at a real host site: your circuit on Zero PCB, inside an enclosure.

Time
3–4 months indicative
Grant
₹70K
Two golden-sample units: a custom green PCB in an open enclosure beside a closed one, with the soil probe

06 / 08 · Execution

TRL 6

Golden sample

A custom PCB and enclosure, tested with real users: 5 for B2B, 20 for B2C.

Time
3–6 months indicative
Grant
₹1.5L
The finished sensor exploded into its parts: cover, gasket, battery, PCB, probe and base

07 / 08 · Execution

TRL 7

First customer

A beta product built to certification standards, and a customer who pays for it.

Time
3–6 months indicative
Grant
₹2.5L
A row of finished soil sensors on a bench, one being tested, with packed boxes ready to ship

08 / 08 · Execution

TRL 8

Qualified product

Everything combined: a qualified system, multiple paying customers, and a build an outside team can repeat.

Time
6–9 months indicative
Grant
Tri-Light
Full Journey

Grants unlock as you enter TRL 4 to 7, up to ₹5L per team. Paid to vendors or reimbursed against invoices, never as cash. Times are indicative.

The loop every project must close

Fundamentals That Matters While You Build

  1. A smoke detector on a ceiling, its cover open, drawing smoke into its sensing chamber as its status light glows

    01Sense

    Your own hardware reads the world. Sensing can’t be borrowed.

  2. The smoke detector’s circuit board, signals glowing from the smoke sensor into its microcontroller

    02Decide

    AI decides, on the device or in the cloud. Your call.

  3. A ceiling sprinkler spraying water onto a fire while the detector’s alarm light glows and a phone lights up with an emergency call

    03Act

    Move something, or tell someone exactly what to do.

Why it’s called Trilight

The Three Forces that Power TRILIGHT

  1. BOM · SOP · QAFCFC

    Light 01

    Build

    An outside team can build a second unit from your SOP, BOM and QA checks.

  2. Light 02

    Test

    A complete, qualified system that holds up in the field, not just on your bench.

  3. Light 03

    Deploy

    Multiple paying customers, or a signed contract to scale.

What it really takes

Know What It Takes to Build Beyond Prototype

Hardware is hard.That’s the point.

Your first prototype will probably fail. So will the third. Trilight doesn’t reward the best pitch; it rewards the team that keeps fixing, testing and showing evidence until the thing works in the real world.

1–2 Year
from first idea to TRL 8, at your own pace
8
stages, cleared by a TRR Committee
Unlimited
retries. Fail, fix, resubmit.
15 days
between team self-reviews
2×
mentor meetings a month (virtual)
₹5,00,000
max grant per team

NIATians, Find Your Way Into TRILIGHT

A student soldering a small sensor board at a lab bench, with a breadboard, sensor modules and a multimeter around her

Standard Door

  • Learn Applied IoT
  • Clear assessments

The score against your evaluation will decide your entry

Three students presenting their working drone prototype and its live telemetry to a reviewer

Fastrack Door

  • Showcase your working prototype and get a direct entry to the program
Join the Program

Who can join

Start Building on Your Terms at Your Pace

  • 01

    Any batch, any branch

    Log in with your NIAT learning portal account.

  • 02

    Solo first, then a team

    Explore alone, then form a team of 3–5 at TRL 1–2.

  • 03

    No fee, no deadlines

    Optional and self-paced. Move up when your evidence is ready.

Problems around you

You are Surrounded by Problems, Spot One & Fix It!

  • A farmer watering dry, cracked soil with a pipe while a small soil sensor stands in the ground

    Farmers water by guesswork and lose crop.

    A soil sensor that says when to irrigate.

  • A nurse checking a patient’s vitals by hand in a small clinic

    Vitals checked by hand, every hour.

    A monitor that flags who needs help.

  • An industrial motor and pump on a factory floor with a small sensor clamped to it

    Machines fail with no warning.

    A sensor that predicts the breakdown.

Program Finale

Demo Day

April2027

Date, venue and format to be announced.

Show what you built to mentors, industry and investors. Live demos of working hardware, not slides.

  • Live demos

    Your prototype, running in front of the room.

  • Meet the people

    Industry partners, investors and the incubation team.

Join now to be ready

FAQ

Have Questions Before You Build?

Still unsure? Ask the program team from your dashboard after you join.

Do I need a hardware idea to join?

No. Take a problem from the TRILIGHT problem bank or bring your own. It must solve a real problem and include real physical sensing.

Do I need prior electronics experience?

No. The Standard Door starts with Applied IoT.

Is there a fee?

Participation is optional and there is no fee.

How are grants paid?

A grant unlocks each time your team enters a funded stage: ₹30,000 at TRL 4, ₹70,000 at TRL 5, ₹1,50,000 at TRL 6 and ₹2,50,000 at TRL 7. It is spent through the program against invoices, not paid into your account.

What happens at a Technology Readiness Review?

A panel examines your team’s evidence and decides whether the stage is cleared. If not, you get written feedback, fix what is missing and present again at the next monthly review.

Who presents at Demo Day?

Every stage has something worth showing, from a breadboard prototype at TRL 4 to a product a customer already pays for at TRL 7, so a team does not have to be finished to take part. Each team decides what it shows, because it owns the work.

Can I keep working on my project afterwards?

Yes. TRL 9 is earned in the market, over years, after a team leaves the program. TRILIGHT takes a team to the point where that test can begin.

Come, Make Your Ideas Real with TRILIGHT

Join the Program
Join the Program