On the Digital India initiative, Pichai said India was undergoing its own revolution
Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Silicon Valley in the US, Google chief executive Sundar Pichai(in picture) has said the Valley’s bigwigs are eagerly waiting for him.
“It is an honour to welcome PM Narendra Modi to Silicon Valley this weekend,” the India-born Pichai said in a YouTube video on Thursday. “I hope PM Modi’s visit will energise people in the Silicon Valley. “We’re looking forward to your remarks at the SAP Centre in San Jose, and also when you come to Google,” Pichai said.
“The bond between India and the Silicon Valley is strong. India has long been an exporter of talent to tech companies. The products built by Indian graduates from IITs (Indian Institutes of Technology) and other institutions have helped revolutionise the world.”
On the Digital India initiative, Pichai said India was undergoing its own revolution. “This will get people in rural areas online. The low cost of bandwidth, offline strategy and affordable phones will connect more people,” he said.
Around 50 million women and 20 million small businesses were expected to go online in India, Pichai said. “Prime Minister Modi’s Digital India vision is central to this revolution. It focuses on connecting the 1.2 billion people in India. It has received tremendous support in India and in Silicon Valley.”
Taking forward his ‘Start-up India, Stand Up India’ campaign, Modi will visit Silicon Valley and address the India-US Startup Konnect there. Officials say the PM is likely to meet a large delegation of Indian-American entrepreneurs and executives in Silicon Valley.
The delegation will be led by Naren Gupta, co-founder of Nexus Venture Partners. During his visit to Silicon Valley, the first by an Indian prime minister, Modi is scheduled to meet Pichai, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Apple CEO Tim Cook, among others.
In a joint statement, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Irish counterpart, Enda Kenny, have said NIIT Ltd will set up a European delivery centre in Dublin. The centre will create 110 jobs in five years.
The development is supported by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, through the Industrial Development Agen cy (IDA), Ireland. NIIT says the proposed centre will deliver comprehensive managed training services, including custom curriculum design and content development, learning administration, learning delivery and strategic sourcing.
For the centre, NIIT will hire engineers, creative writers, digital media professionals, trainers, multilingual customer service support staff and project managers.
“Europe is an important and growing market for NIIT’s corporate learning group. Ireland was our country of choice for its extremely conducive business environment, strategic location, availability of multilingual creative and technical talent and investment potential,” said Sapnesh Lalla, president (corporate learning group), NIIT.
