(Pic- JK Paper-IIT Delhi MoU Signing Ceremony)

New Delhi- JK Paper, the pioneer of branded paper in India, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with IIT Delhi, the country’s premier institution for higher education, for setting up JK Paper Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Paper and Packaging at the Institute.

The MoU was signed on Wednesday by Mr. A.S. Mehta, President and Director, JK Paper and senior IIT Delhi functionaries (Dr. Anil Wali, MD, Foundation for Innovation and Technology Transfer (FITT); Prof. Anurag S. Rathore, Dean, Corporate Relations and Prof. Ashwini K. Agrawal, Textile and Fibre Engineering Dept.) in the presence of Prof. V. Ramgopal Rao, Director, IIT Delhi.

The CoE will bring synergy and coherence in the activities being carried out at the Institute in this domain. Under the CoE umbrella, apart from multitude of sponsored research project, there will be executive development programme, expert lectures, training and knowledge transfer and other projects of mutual interest.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr. A. S. Mehta, President and Director, JK Paper Ltd. said, “It is a privilege to embark on a collaborative journey with IIT Delhi. The paper and packaging industry is undergoing massive transformation with ever-increasing need for sustainable and functional products thereby driving new innovations. The proposed CoE would combine the cutting-edge research at IIT Delhi with application know-how of JK Paper to accelerate innovation in Paper and Packaging and develop solutions for a variety of end-use applications of our customers”.

Welcoming this collaboration, Prof. V. Ramgopal Rao, Director, IIT Delhi said, “We are happy to be associated with JK Papers and look forward to the immense research and development opportunities this CoE will bring and excited to work together on futuristic technologies of mutual interest”.

Prof Rao added, "IIT Delhi has made significant contributions in many areas including academic activities, research, innovation and technology development. Collaborations between industry and academia will help us in our pursuit of excellence and will also further strengthen the public research and innovation ecosystem of India”.

Prof. Anurag S. Rathore, Dean, Corporate Relations, IIT Delhi said, “It’s a matter of pride that this collaboration with IIT Delhi will benefit both the entities”. He added, “The strong brand equity of JK Paper has been built through the use of latest technologies, continuous research & development and innovation and we are happy to embark on the path of collaborations”.

Prof. Ashwini K. Agrawal, who will be the CoE’s Coordinator, said the Centre of Excellence aims at developing new technologies for the paper and packaging industry in the country. He added the collaboration would bring together the knowledge of IIT Delhi in emerging areas of sciences and engineering and expertise of the industry in manufacturing to create new knowledge, novel products, and train much needed research manpower in this sector.

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About JK Paper Ltd.

JK Paper Limited, a part of USD 4.3 bn JK Organisation, is a leading Indian Pulp and Paper manufacturer. JK Group’s Paper business started in 1938 and is the pioneer of branded paper in India. Presently, it is the leading player in Office paper, Coated paper, and Packaging Board in the country. Its existing Pulp and Paper Mills are located at Rayagada (Odisha), Songadh (Gujarat) and Sirpur (Telangana). Company’s current manufacturing capacity stands at 5.91 Lac MTPA and is coming up with new capacity of 1.7 Lac MTPA of Packaging Board at its unit CPM (Songadh, Gujarat) which will commence production this quarter. Subsequently, the total capacity will increase to 7.61 Lac MTPA. It is exporting to countries in Middle East, Southeast Asia, SAARC, the African continent, and the USA.

About IIT Delhi

Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi is one of the 23 IITs created to be National Centres of Excellence for training, research and development in science, engineering, and technology in India. Established as College of Engineering in 1961, the Institute was later declared as an Institution of National Importance under the "Institutes of Technology (Amendment) Act, 1963" and was renamed as "Indian Institute of Technology Delhi'. Since its inception, over 50,000 have graduated from IIT Delhi, of which more than 5500 are with a Ph.D. degree, in various disciplines including Engineering, Physical Sciences, Management and Humanities & Social Sciences. In 2018, IIT Delhi received the special status of Institution of Eminence (IoE) by the Govt. of India, giving it greater autonomy in various matters including hiring of foreign faculty and starting collaborations with foreign institutions.