Bangalore: Even as the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) versus Indian government spat continues over autonomy and pay revision issues, many of them are beginning to launch projects along with global universities to offer students and faculty more opportunities besides collaborative research and development with foreign academic partners, reports Business Standard. IIT-Delhi, for instance, has designed four courses for the Addis Ababa University in Ethiopia. Many students in Ethiopia are studying engineering and technology in virtual classrooms, some of their teachers sitting in the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, which is helping that country become tech-savvy. "The Ethiopian government is making a rapid expansions in education but it doesn't have the required infrastructure. The ambassador talked to us and then the process moved. Even their prime minister was very eager for this association," M. Balakrishnan, Dean of post-graduate studies at IIT-Delhi. "They want to churn out tech-savvy students, and here we are playing a role. We have designed four courses for the Addis Ababa University," said Balakrishnan. Two courses - construction technology and management, and chemical engineering - have been taught for a semester. The other two courses - computer engineering and manufacturing engineering - will complete their first semester in a couple of months. "Initially, we have a four-year agreement with Ethiopia. Our job is to develop curriculum, set up a laboratory, give teachings both through virtual classroom and face to face mode. We are also responsible for students' evaluation. But the degree will be awarded by the Addis Ababa University," said Balakrishnan. Likewise, the Indian Institute of Technology-Kanpur (IIT-K) has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the University of Texas, San Antonio, U.S., for collaborative research. The project involves around five faculty and 10 students. "The areas identified for collaborative research include fields like bio-material, where the focus will be on the research collaboration, faculty and student exchange programme. The co-operative research programme in other areas of mutual interest will be conceived later," said K Muralidhar, Dean - research and development of IIT Kanpur. The Indo-U.S. center for bio-material is funding the project. The long-term goal of this MoU is to research on low-cost implants in a human body, like knee replacements. In India, currently knee replacements are expensive and costs between 30,000 and 2 lakh. In another deal, IIT-Kanpur has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with its Malaysian counterpart, Universiti Sains Malaysia, for setting up of an electronic hub in Penang. Muralidhar said that around 20 faculty and about 100 students are expected to be involved in this project. The research projects would be funded by industry partners in communications and the semi-conductor industries. IIT Kharagpur (IIT-KGP), is setting up a 350-700 bed medical college and has signed a MoU with University of California, San Diego, as a partner for this venture. The collaboration is both for part-financing the project as well as an academic collaboration. Initially IIT-KGP would fund the project with the 800 crore investment it had announced earlier in infrastructure expansion till 2011. The institute is also seeking additional 1,000 crore for further expansion, to build more centres of excellence and to accommodate a total of 20,000 students by 2020 from 8,000 right now, among other plans.