What we do?

  • We help people act with insight.
  • We help companies grow from the inside.
  • We help employees turn into thinkers.

We ignite thought

If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.

--Thomas Jefferson
on Patents and Freedom of Ideas

We help people move away from the awe of ignorance to the awe of understanding.

Acadinnet's primary aim in presenting this lecture series is twofold. (1) To identify, from those attending the lectures, a group of young people with the ambition of becoming the Faradays and Maxwells of tomorrow; and (2) to encourage industry to sponsor them for a mentoring program that Acadinnet would be happy to execute so that these mentees actively strive to become world-class innovators by working in industry.

The lectures are built around the observation that the distinguishing quality of smart innovators is their ability to think in conceptual terms, and zero in on the set of concepts they need to bear on the problem they are addressing. They instinctively think out-of-the-box as well as strive to enlarge-the-box when addressing a problem. It is for this reason, lectures in the series deal with a wide range of scientific and mathematical concepts and ideas developed over centuries. They were chosen to show how apparently diverse ideas are often linked through an abstract pattern and thereby show that migrating or borrowing ideas from one discipline to another comes easily to those able to work at high conceptual levels. Our aim is to help people develop a feel for connecting concepts in order to solve a problem requiring multidisciplinary knowledge.

The full lecture series covers topics from axiomatic mathematics, classical and quantum mechanics, quantum computing, molecular biology, chaos and fractals, information theory, astrophysics, innovation and invention, intellectual property rights, software engineering, computer science, algorithms, and general advice to biotechnology start-ups.

To view lecture abstracts, visit Insights in Science Lecture Abstracts.

The lectures will be delivered by Professor Rajendra Bera, Chief mentor of Acadinnet.

A subset of these lectures is available as S&T mini-lecture series; it includes the following 6 lectures:
Axiomatic mathematics
How reliably can we compute?
On symmetry in physics
Quantum cryptography and quantum teleportation
Set theory
On innovation

The target audience is the untapped, unpolished group of talented people waiting to be discovered, mentored, and who dream of becoming world-class technology innovators one day. We will be looking for the likes of Faradays and Maxwells of the future among them. But all those with an interest in the mysterious world of science and mathematics are welcome to attend. Confused understanding of mathematics and science should not deter one from attending. In particular, topics related to advanced mathematics, quantum physics, chaos and fractals, etc. although complex are surprisingly easy to understand as are the mathematical foundations on which they rest even for people with high-school level knowledge in science and mathematics.

Intellectual Property Lecture Abstracts
On innovation
In a competitive world where economic survival depends on being innovative, significant problems generally require beyond the state-of-the-art knowledge to find a solution. That is why competitive advantage devolves on societies which provide quality university education, foster well-complemented university-industry R&D collaborations, and are willing to welcome brains-in-circulation from anywhere in the world. Most people seem to forget that R&D and innovation are twin sisters.
Part I Copyright, trademark, trade secret
Some basic aspects of intellectual property rights related to copyright, trademark, and trade secret will be discussed. Patents will be discussed in the next lecture.
Part II Patent
This lecture will cover matters related to patentability, who can be named as an inventor in a patent, and ownership of patents. Important aspects related to the preparation of a patent application will also be discussed.
Part III Patent prosecution
Prosecution is the process by which a patent application is defended before the patent office before it takes a decision on the patent application. The process is both time consuming and rigorous. It typically consists of arguing in writing with an examiner about claims: over prior art, technical details, legal precedents, and claim language specifics. Important aspects related to patent prosecution will be discussed.
Part IV Infringement & litigation
Getting patents which will be found valid, enforceable and infringed when involved in patent infringement litigation are crucial. Infringed patents can be enforced through litigation; a patent is essentially the right to sue. Infringement and litigation is mainly about the power to regulate the manner in which goods and services are sold; it is not about the way people use those goods and services. Getting a patent and getting an enforceable patent are two different things. Important aspects related to infringement and litigation will be discussed.
Part V The 'Bayh-Dole' Acts
The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 enacted in the U.S. in 1980 has been emulated by several other countries. After years of expectation, India too introduced a similar bill titled "Protection and Utilization of Public Funded Intellectual Property Bill 2008" in the Rajya Sabha on December 15, 2008. We examine the possible impact of the bill should it become law in light of experiences in the U.S. and Japan.
Chief Mentor's Corner
  1. Bera, R. K., Method and system for processing of allocation and deallocation requests in a computing environment, Patent No. US 8,195,802 (issued June 5, 2012).
  2. Bera, R. K., Method, apparatus and computer program product for network design and analysis, Patent No. US 8,176,108 (issued May 8, 2012).
  3. Bera, R. K., Listing and modifying groups of blocks in the editing of a document, Patent No. US 8,122,349 (issued February 21, 2012).
  4. Bera, R. K., Run-Time parallelization of loops in computer programs using bit vectors, Patent No. US 8,028,281 (issued September 27, 2011).
  5. Bera, R. K., Compiler optimization of source code by determination and utilization of the equivalence of algebraic expressions in the source code, Patent No. US 8,028,280 (issued September 27, 2011).
  6. Bera, R. K., Concurrent editing of a file by multiple authors, Patent No. US 7,954,043 (issued May 31, 2011).
  7. Bera, R. K., Restructuring computer programs, Patent No. US 7,934,205 (issued Apr 26, 2011).
  8. Bera, R. K., Method, system and program product for data searching, JP3832821 (B2), (issued October 11, 2006).