IIT Madras Team Agnirath Unveils Solar-Powered Car for Bridgestone World Solar Challenge

IIT Madras students from Team Agnirath have built a solar-powered car named ‘Aagneya,’ which is set to compete in the global Bridgestone World Solar Challenge. Check details here

IIT Madras Team Agnirath Unveils Solar-Powered Car

Students from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras have designed, developed, and built a solar-powered car named ‘Aagneya’. Created by Team Agnirath from the Centre for Innovation (CFI), India’s largest student body, the vehicle is set to compete in the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge 2025. Prof. V. Kamakoti, Director of IIT Madras, unveiled the solar-powered vehicle ‘Aagneya’ on campus, in the presence of Prof. Sathyanarayana N. Gummadi, Dean (Students), Prof. MS Sivakumar, Faculty Advisor to Team Agnirath, Team Agnirath students, Centre for Innovation (CFI) staff, and other stakeholders, including the team’s sponsors.

Bridgestone World Solar Challenge 2025

The Bridgestone World Solar Challenge 2025 is the world’s premier solar technology innovation race. This biennial event features a challenging 3,000-kilometre journey from Darwin to Adelaide, Australia, scheduled for August 24 to 31, 2025. Bringing together the brightest minds from across the globe, the challenge pushes the boundaries of technological innovation as teams design, engineer, and build energy-efficient electric vehicles powered entirely by solar energy to traverse the Australian outback.

Expressing confidence in the technology developed by Team Agnirath, Prof. V. Kamakoti, Director, IIT Madras, said, “I am sure this team will succeed. For this car to go to Australia, we need resources. We need to grow the Institute, all of your start-ups to flourish and we want all of you to give back to the Institute so that we can encourage more start-ups.”

Prof. V. Kamakoti added, “We are coming out with a very robust mechanism to support start-ups and take you to the next level. We had incubated more than 100 start-ups and filed more than 470 patents in the last financial year alone. We had the first IPO recently from an IIT Madras-incubated start-up. We plough the money that comes back into other start-ups. The students must have the confidence that if they are part of start-up from IIT Madras, it will lead to an unicorn.”

TEAM AGNIRATH

What started in 2021 with just six passionate individuals has grown into a multidisciplinary team of 38 dedicated students from diverse fields, all pushing the boundaries of engineering to build solar race cars that proudly represent India in international competitions against teams from prestigious universities worldwide.

Sharing his enthusiasm about this upcoming global content, Sairam J., Business Module Lead, Team Agnirath and a third-year Biological Science student, IIT Madras, said, “The Bridgestone World Solar Challenge is far more than just a race. It's recognized as the most demanding engineering competition in the world stretching over 3,000 kilometres from Darwin to Adelaide through the unforgiving Australian outback. Daytime temperatures soar above 50°C and drop below 5°C at night. Crosswinds often exceed 60 km/h, challenging vehicle stability and aerodynamics.”

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