IBM and CHRIST (Deemed to be University) have established the IBM Innovation Center for Artificial Intelligence, an industry-academia initiative aimed at advancing AI education, research and talent development while giving students and researchers access to enterprise AI technologies.
The centre will provide students, faculty members, researchers and PhD scholars with opportunities to develop and apply artificial intelligence capabilities using enterprise technologies and real-world use cases. The initiative is designed to bring academic research and practical AI development closer together.
Its areas of focus will include generative AI, agentic AI, large language models, retrieval-augmented generation, intelligent automation and responsible AI. Participants will be able to use IBM technologies to develop enterprise AI applications through interdisciplinary research and solution development.
Among the technologies available through the initiative are watsonx.ai, IBM's AI development studio, and watsonx Orchestrate, which the company describes as an agentic control plane for scaling and governing AI. Participants will also work with IBM Bob, an AI development partner designed to support different stages of the software development lifecycle.
The collaboration will also include training programmes delivered by IBM Expert Labs. These hands-on sessions will be available to faculty members, PhD scholars and postgraduate students, with the aim of developing expertise in enterprise AI technologies and supporting the creation of AI applications across disciplines.
Participants will additionally receive access to IBM SkillsBuild, the technology company's free education programme, as part of their learning and certification journey.
Dr. Fr. Jose C C, Vice Chancellor of CHRIST (Deemed to be University), said the collaboration is intended to create an ecosystem where education, research and industry can converge. He added that access to enterprise-grade AI technologies would enable students and researchers to develop practical solutions while working with responsible and ethical AI principles.
Siddhesh Naik, Executive Director, Growth Markets, Technology Sales, IBM India & South Asia, said stronger collaboration between academia and industry could help strengthen India's AI talent pipeline and prepare the workforce for increasing adoption of the technology.
The centre also places emphasis on how artificial intelligence is changing software development. Vishal Chahal, Vice President, IBM India Software Lab, said students and researchers will use IBM Bob to explore how AI can be applied across different stages of the software lifecycle.
Beyond classroom learning and technical training, the centre will support collaborative research and industry engagement. Its planned activities include internships, hackathons and innovation challenges, giving participants opportunities to experiment with emerging AI technologies and apply them to real-world problems.
The initiative comes as businesses increasingly explore generative and agentic AI applications, increasing demand for professionals who can work with enterprise AI systems while understanding areas such as governance and responsible deployment.
For IBM and CHRIST University, the new centre brings these requirements into an academic setting by combining technical training, research and industry exposure. Rather than focusing only on theoretical AI education, the collaboration is structured around practical access to enterprise tools and opportunities to develop applications across disciplines.
The initiative adds to the growing role of industry-academia partnerships in developing AI skills as organisations look for talent capable of taking artificial intelligence from experimentation into real-world deployment.
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