Bengaluru: Putting India’s innovation hub — Bengaluru — on par with Tokyo, Boston, Silicon Valley, Tel Aviv, London and Frankfurt, experts called for a global coalition of tech-intensive cities.
Insisting that the ‘safety of the planet’ lies in the hands of technology, T.V. Mohandas Pai, co-founder and chairperson of Aarin Capital, said geopolitics today will be guided by technology.
He was speaking at the sixth edition of the Global Tech Summit Wednesday, during a panel discussion on building a technology innovation hub. The summit, held annually since 2016, is jointly organised by the Ministry of External Affairs and think-tank Carnegie India. ThePrint is a digital partner for this year’s event.
Biocon chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw and R.K. Misra, non-resident scholar of Carnegie India, were also part of the panel.
Shaw, Pai and Misra spoke about the lessons Karnataka has to offer to the country, and the way forward to enhance innovation.
“China maybe overtaking US in multiple layers of technology, but the rest of the world should come together to ensure technology is used for peace and not hegemony. We have to work in collaboration in areas of high-tech which can be used for humanity in a more egalitarian and democratic way,” Pai said, adding that Bengaluru has R&D centres for 450 Fortune 500 companies in the world.
“The pandemic has shown us that we can’t hide anywhere. We are in the same boat and have to work together. We have to think big. Geopolitics, for me, is going to be technology-led with tech creation, innovation and domination. It is going to determine the future safety of the planet,” he said.
‘Bengaluru always had spirit of inquiry’
In conversation with R.K. Misra on what Karnataka could teach to the rest of the country in the field of innovation and technology, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw said the state was the only one in India where there was no trust deficit between the government and private companies.
“Bengaluru has always had a spirit of inquiry, focus on science and engineering. There was a huge focus on being experimental and inquiry,” she said, retracing Bengaluru’s journey to becoming India’s innovation hub.
“First generation entrepreneurs took a risk on an untrodden path like Infosys in IT and Biocon in BT. That’s the first indicator of a innovation-centric city. Added to that was a government that believed that tech sectors will drive the future of economy,” the Biocon chairperson added, lauding public-private partnerships through vision groups.
She, however, added that poor infrastructure in Bengaluru was its bane. “Bengaluru is the only city of the future that India can really brag about. We have created the basic building blocks of a world-class city. If only our infrastructure was world-class, we would be flying by now. That is what is dragging us down. Everything else is world-class,” Mazumdar-Shaw said.
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Digital health
Insisting that India had leveraged digital technologies better than other countries during the pandemic, Mazumdar-Shaw said it was time to use it for other health-related concerns.
“We developed Aarogya Setu app to contact-trace and track every infected person. We developed CoWin app that captured all data associated with test results and vaccines, we had QR code on vaccination certificates. We have created the largest database on vaccination in the world. We are also now capturing sequencing data. We should now leverage these platforms for other disease management too,” she said, pointing out that digital health had arrived and it was time for India to generate data and share it with the world.
Pai offered a five-point programme to make India, specifically Bengaluru, the preferred destination for start-ups. “We need a high-tech vision, invest in top of the pyramid, funding R&D in 10 areas like AI, BT, space research, Quantum computing, Metaverse etc. We need to create a policy and kitty of Rs 500,000 crore in state government to invest in research,” he said.
(Edited by Neha Mahajan)
Disclosure: Kiran Mazumdar Shaw is among the distinguished founder-investors of ThePrint. Please click here for details on investors.
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