During his visit to the United States, Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Google, met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss Google’s strategic initiatives for India. The key areas of collaboration included artificial intelligence (AI), cybersecurity, fintech, and skill development.
Pichai expressed his belief in India’s enormous potential in AI and highlighted the exciting opportunities for further progress in the country.
Outlined below are the significant announcements made by Sundar Pichai:
1. Google to establish a global fintech operations centre in GIFT City, Gujarat
Recognizing India’s fintech leadership, particularly with the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and Aadhaar, Pichai emphasized Google’s aim to bolster this foundation and expand its impact worldwide.
“We are thrilled by the advancements made and, with the rise of AI, India has a truly exciting opportunity to forge ahead. We are fully committed to supporting the Prime Minister’s vision,” Pichai stated.
2. Continued investment in India
Last year, during his visit to India, Pichai announced Google’s plan to invest $10 billion in India’s digitization fund. He reiterated Google’s unwavering commitment to invest further, particularly in AI-focused companies.
3. Expanding Bard to encompass more Indian languages
Pichai unveiled plans to expand Google’s Bard, a conversational chatbot powered by generative AI, to include additional Indian languages. This expansion aligns with Google’s ongoing efforts to facilitate text and voice-based internet searches in over 100 Indian languages.
4. Collaboration across various domains
According to the Ministry of External Affairs, Prime Minister Modi invited Sundar Pichai to explore collaborative opportunities in AI, fintech, cybersecurity products and services, as well as mobile device manufacturers in India. The discussions also involved fostering partnerships between Google and Indian academic institutions to promote research, development, and skill enhancement.
Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the United States, scheduled from June 21 to June 24, includes interactions with prominent CEOs such as Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Apple’s Tim Cook, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, and AMD’s Lisa Su, in addition to Sundar Pichai.
Pichai praised Prime Minister Modi’s visionary Digital India initiative, stating that it has become a blueprint for other countries. He also commended India’s progress in scaling up its digital infrastructure, which serves as a model for other nations, including those within the G20. Pichai expressed Google’s enthusiasm for being a partner on India’s journey towards economic growth.
During his visit to India in December, Pichai announced that a portion of the India Digitization Fund would be dedicated to supporting startups led by women. Google also collaborated with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru to collect speech data from 773 districts across India, contributing to the enhancement of language translation and search technologies. Furthermore, Google granted $1 million to establish India’s first responsible AI centre at IIT Madras and $1 million through Google.Org to Wadhwani AI for leveraging advanced technology in agriculture.