For Saravanan Sundaramoorthy online games are not just a pastime but are often designed to help the brain function better.
Sounds bizarre? Saravanan, the founder of Edsix Brain Lab, explains, “While players indulge in a range of games, a special software assesses their strengths and weaknesses based on their performance. We call it ‘Gamefication of Cognitive Skills’.” Cognitive skills is something that most corporates look for in candidates when they hire. “It’s no more about what you learn in textbooks. It’s about qualities like critical thinking, problem solving, lateral thinking and decision making. Unfortunately, schools and colleges don’t hone such skills. We try to do that in an interesting manner,” says Saravanan, who along with Kalpana Murthy started http://www.skillangels.com in February 2013.
After assessing the performance, the players are made to play games that can help improve the areas they are weak in. “We have more than 500 games for school kids, college students and corporate professionals. People can access them through the site and users have to pay for the packages,” says Saravanan. “They have also developed a pilot project for people with dyslexia and autism,” adds Kalpana.
The project was incubated by IIT Madras Rural Technology Business Incubator (RTBI). Saravanan and Kalpana are also the winners of the Tech4Impact Accelerator Program 2013, supported by IIM Ahmedabad Center of Innovation Incubation and Enterpreneurship (CIIE), Ahmedabad and Village Capital, U.S.
