Routers, iOS, Android, networks, optical fiber network, or say Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and et al – are not words that usually are in politicians’ lexicon, and spoken – rarely, if at all, especially when talking about strengthening bilateral relationship on a people-to-people level.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was seemingly an exception when he visited Silicon Valley last week meeting with the CEOs and top leadership of companies like Google, Microsoft, Apple and Telsa Motors in the Mecca of high-tech during his two-day visit to the West Coast, did exactly that – talking in a language and using these words that are easily understandable to the likes of Google and Microsoft.
He spoke in a language that CEOs of top tech companies understood, and as a result pledged to partner with India in its development goals.
Modi met with Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella, Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai and Alphabet’s CEO and Google co-founder Larry Page, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Qualcomm’s Executive Chairman Paul E. Jacobs, CISCO’s John Chambers, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narain and Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk during his packed two-day trip where he presented a strong case for top American companies to come to India to help spur the country’s development and also to expand their businesses.
“His trip was a show of force of how far India has come— and how well he understands technology. Modi was able to stand head to head with Silicon Valley’s leaders and he outshone them. He understood and articulated the role of technology in transforming India better than they could,” Vivek Wadhwa, Fellow, Arthur & Toni Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Governance, Stanford University, told Desi Talk.
“I have spoken to many people who say the same things — that we were blown away with Modi’s understanding of the issues and ability to inspire audiences whether at the community address at SAP, or in meetings with the top-notch tech-entrepreneurs,” Wadhwa , who is also director of research, CERC, Pratt School of Engineering, Duke University, told this correspondent.Modi said at Digital India Dinner Sept 27 in San Jose, attended among others, by Nadella, Pichai and Narain, that in the digital age there is an opportunity to transform lives of people in ways that was hard to imagine just a couple of decades ago and that is what sets people apart from the century that has just been left behind.
“There may be still some who see the digital economy as the tool of the rich, educated and the privileged. But, ask the taxi driver or the corner vendor in India what he has gained from his cell phone, and the debate gets settled.
“I see technology as a means to empower and as a tool that bridges the distance between hope and opportunity. Social media is reducing social barriers. It connects people on the strength of human values, not identities,” Modi said.
A day after in Silicon Valley Modi had a glimpse into the future of his project of promoting and fostering entrepreneurship when he visited the “India-US Startup Konnect 2015” exposition showcasing India’s strengths in the start-up ecosystem through the displays of some 40 companies.
Reid Garrett Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, said the key success of Silicon Valley and the global tech and entrepreneurship hub was not start-ups, but scale-ups. “What the prime minister is doing in terms of ‘Digital India’ is a great leadership,” he said.
Google announced in the presence of Modi at their headquarters that the Internet giant to begin with will provide high-speed public Wi-Fi in 400 Indian railway stations that carry millions of passengers every day, giving the company an important headway in the country. Google is working with the Indian Railways and RailTel, a government-owned provider of telecommunications infrastructure to the railways, to initially cover 100 of the busiest stations in India before the end of 2016.
“Even with just the first 100 stations online, this project will make Wi-Fi available for the more than 10 million people who pass through every day,” wrote Google CEO Sundar Pichai in a blog post.
From next month, Google will make it possible for people to type in 10 different languages in India, including Gujarati. The feature will go live in the next month.
It was not just Google.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced that the company plans to partner with the Indian government to bring in low-cost broadband connectivity to 500,000 villages in India. “We believe that lost-cost broad band connectivity coupled with the scale of cloud computing intelligence that can be harnessed from data, can help drive creativity, efficiency and productivity across governments and businesses of all sizes,” Nadella said at the meeting with Modi. Microsoft also announced the availability of its cloud services operating out of India’s data centers, will become operational next week.
During his sojourn in California Modi met with California Gov. Edmund Brown and later with Salman Khan, founder of Khan Academy, a non-profit educational organization that is a free online educational platform producing videos on diverse subjects for students.
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