On October 20, 2022, DRDO signed an agreement with the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT Jodhpur) in order to set up a DRDO-industry-academia centre of excellence (DIA – CoE).

The CoE seeks to pursue joint research in diverse verticals in collaboration between industry, academia, and research labs of DRDO. The faculty members and students of IIT Jodhpur will carry out the research using the laboratories offered by DRDO with academics, industries, and research institutes.

The centre of excellence at IIT Jodhpur mainly focuses on research in artificial intelligence (AI) for informational and wargaming technologies, desert welfare technologies, and futuristic Omni-mobility. The science & technology initiatives recognised by DRDO will also be carried out at the centre.

The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT Jodhpur) has abilities in multiple spheres that connect to strategy and warfare areas, including artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), technologies for desert operations, robotics to develop technologies, mobility, and virtual reality (VR). These capabilities made IIT Jodhpur an appropriate choice for DRDO to set up the CoE.

Governing council of the centre, currently chaired by the DRDO chairman and co-chaired by IIT Jodhpur's director, will appoint the director of the centre of excellence. Apart from this, senior academicians appointed by the director of IIT Jodhpur, the Dean of resource and development, and the registrar will become council members. The research advisory will consist of members from the Institute.

Santanu Chaudhary, director of IIT Jodhpur, spoke about the collaboration between IIT Jodhpur & DRDO and stated that the MoU offers a significant opportunity to develop an alliance between IIT Jodhpur, DRDO, and industries to develop technology for making India independent in defence technologies, not only today but also to facilitate the development of futuristic technologies for the world, driven by the practical requirements of the modern battlefield.

Recently, IIT Jodhpur also collaborated with Algo8 AI in order to make petroleum and allied industries more efficient by developing a data pipeline build-up machine and machine learning models for heat exchangers of oil & petroleum refineries.