Mumbai: The Indian Institute of Creative Technologies (IICT) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Game Developers Association of India (GDAI) to collaborate on strengthening game development education, industry engagement, and ecosystem development in the country.
The MoU establishes a structured framework for academic–industry cooperation within the video games and interactive entertainment sector. Through this partnership, IICT and GDAI will work towards closer knowledge exchange, industry-linked learning, and talent development initiatives, aimed at better aligning education with real-world game development requirements.
The collaboration will explore opportunities for curriculum dialogue, structured industry engagement, and ecosystem-oriented initiatives that support the creation of production-ready talent for India’s rapidly growing gaming industry.
Commenting on the collaboration, Shridhar Muppidi, Chairman, GDAI, said, “India’s gaming industry has scaled rapidly in terms of users and content consumption, but the availability of production-ready talent remains uneven across studios and roles. This partnership is intended to address that imbalance by aligning education pathways more closely with real-world development requirements and emerging technologies.”
Dr Ashish Kulkarni, Founding Director, IICT, said, “For India to build sustainable leadership in the AVGC-XR sector, education must evolve in step with industry workflows and global standards. Industry-linked collaborations are essential to ensure that curriculum design, tools, and pedagogy remain relevant to how content is actually created and monetised.”
Launched in May 2025 by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of India, in association with FICCI and CII, IICT has been conceived as a national hub for creative technology education and innovation. The institute offers industry-driven programmes across gaming, animation, post-production, comics, and XR technologies.
IICT commenced its inaugural academic batch in August 2025 with 18 courses at its Phase-I campus on Pedder Road, Mumbai. The programmes span short-term, long-term, and diploma formats, catering to students and working professionals across the AVGC-XR ecosystem, reinforcing India’s ambition to build globally competitive creative technology talent.
