Theme: Thought Conflux

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized (subject to certain rules and regulations).

Infosys Campus
Technopark Campus II
Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, 695583
India

Balan Madhavan

Balan Madhavan is the only Fellow of the International League of Conservation Photographers and one of the two from the whole of Asia in this elite group of 60 nature photographers of the world in which almost every one is a National Geographic contributing photographer. When he is not shooting wild nature in its pristine glory in remote corners of the world, Balan is busy shooting tourist destinations around India, particularly the south. His images are used for the promotion of tourism by many Indian states. He employs photography as both a tool and a mission statement for conservation. He also won the UN Award for nature photography in 1992, with his entry being selected from more than 34,000 entries worldwide. In this Talk, Mr. Madhavan gives a wonderful insight into the life of a conservation photographer, the challenges and conflicts he faces in bringing the beautiful pictures for the viewing pleasures of audiences and some unintended consequences of nature photography

Jabir Karat

Jabir Karat is a Social entrepreneur who started Green Worms, an organization dedicated to making the environment more safer by specializing in waste management techniques. Green Worms conducts waste literacy programmes in schools, where they educate young minds about the adverse effects of ill treated waste. In this talks, he speaks about how weddings and parties can reduce carbon footprint and landfill by tweaking some of the waste management strategies.

Joseph Thomas

An active motor sports enthusiast who has been active in the field of motor sports since 1984 in various capacities, as a rally driver, as an executive with J A Motorsports, one of the biggest motorsport companies in India. He now owns a racing team M&N Racing and has been running teams in the international Motorsports arena in India and the Middle East as part of the MRF 2000 series. He was also a part of the Indian touring car championship in 2012/13. He is currently making a film on the lives of two drivers, Mathias Lauda and Freddie Hunt, sons of legendary Formula 1 World Champions, Niki Lauda and James Hunt on whose lives the hollywood movie RUSH was based on. In his talk, he speaks about the risk taking approach and how having that attitude makes anything possible.

Joshua Mathew

Joshua K Mathew is the co-founder of Ellipsor. He along with some friends created NEOSENSE, a monitor to identify breathlessness in premature babies and alert the caregiver. NEOSENSE is an apnea detector for neonates designed by Ellipsor. His team was shortlisted at the MIT Global Founders &Skill Accelerator in 2015. In this talk, he details the talks about affordable Neonatal care and how his invention cuts down the cost of healthcare.

K.R Vijayan

When it comes to Mr. Vijayan, a tea seller from Kochi who travelled to 16 countries from the income he got on his tea stall, a decade’s worth of stories echoing hard work, sweat and conquered dreams fall onto our laps. He serves as one of the best examples of the famous proverb, “Where there is a will, there is a way”. In this talk, he shares his experience of how he managed to travel to several countries despite his modest background.

Noel Benno

Noel Benno is the founder of Storytime, a project that he was inspired to start when an underprivileged kid asked him for an old story book. He started it with the mission to provide underprivileged school kids access to a reading environment by setting up small libraries in rural schools and communities. The project is ongoing and is still an all volunteer project with international presence in 4 countries, and national presence in 4 states of India. At TEDxthiruvananthapuram he talks about how access to stories can transform education amongst children with limited access to education.

Varun Venkit

Varun is a published clinical psychologist and author. He is a certified drum circle facilitator, masters NLP practitioner, percussionist and trainer. He is the founder / director of Taal Inc.; an organization that positively influences health and well-being through rhythm, music and the arts. His journey with rhythm has seen him through drumming with Agnee, Sivamani, Taufiq and Fazal Qureshi and many more greats in the percussion world. Apart from this he has facilitated a drumming event for the first lady Michelle Obama in 2010. In his talk he goes through how drumming and help in stress reduction.

Vinay Menon

Stand-up comedy is just catching on in the State of Kerala. Vinay Menon is among the very few who pursue this genre. He is an IT professional- turned- comedian, and focuses mainly on observational humor. He is also a professor and in this talk he has a humorous take on the myths of the Indian Education System.