ISLAMABAD: Microsoft Research (Redmond), the research and development arm of global software leader, Microsoft Corporation, USA has accepted a proposal for award of a research grant for development of SoftUPS. Ignite (Formerly National ICT R&D Fund), an organization of Ministry of IT, has provided support to Dr. Affan Syed and his team for research projects that greatly helped the Researcher to build capacity and qualify for such a prestigious grant. The research would start from 01 July 2013.

Ignite (Formerly National ICT R&D Fund), established in 2005, has so far funded 86 R&D projects at total cost of Rs. 1.42 billion. Out of these, 10 projects have won various national and international awards, 4 patents filed and 189 publications published by various academia and industry organizations and researchers. The Fund has also offered scholarships to 3,875 students of undergraduate studies in information and communication technologies (ICTs) related disciplines mostly from rural areas on pure merit and has disbursed Rs. 1.85 billion on such scholarships.

The SoftUPS solution builds upon a recent technology developed by MSR called HomeOS, intended to provide an OS like abstraction for smart Homes. The solution aims to build a smart-home application that replaces current UPS based solutions to load-shedding, with a more ICT-inspired, greener, lower-cost, and more efficient solution; hence the name “SoftUPS”.