Indian techies sees tremendous opportunity in 'Digital India'

Washington, Sep 24: A section of Indian techies, who have made a mark for themselves in the highly competitive Silicon Valley, see tremendous opportunity for them in the ambitious Digital India plan of the Modi government.

Prakash Bhalerao, a successful entrepreneur said, India is moving up the value chain from being in service industry to a product development paradigm. The early venture capitalists investing in India replicated successful business models of Silicon Valley like Flipkart based on Amazon, Ola Cabs based on Uber and so on and they have given good return to the VCs, Bhalerao said at a penal discussion on Digital India in Sunnyvale.

However, this could change as new products for Indian markets are now beginning to emerge, Bhalerao, a venture capitalist, said.

"We believe Prime Minister Modi sees an important role of technology and innovation from Silicon Valley in his plan of making India transition from a developing nation to a developed nation," said Khanderao Kand, director, Big Data at Oracle and founder of Global Indian Technology Professionals Organisation.

There is an overwhelming sentiment of techies and entrepreneurs from the Silicon Valley who are eager to welcome Modi over the weekend, he said. Ashok Banerjee, chief technology officer and vice president engineering at Symantec, said lack of digitisation leads to long delays in getting services and healthcare.

This results in lack of transparency and corruption in the system. Observing that in India a lot of productivity is lost due to waiting in queues to get things done, he said, this could easily be done online like here in US.

"Privacy concerns are everywhere, but that does not mean you do not digitize, but instead you do it in a secure fashion," Banerjee said. He said without digitisation and sharing of data securely, such high-value companies like AirBnB, would not have come into existence and the popularity of these services indicate that people are willing to share their information as long as they are secured by an entity or government policies.

According to Bhalerao for 'StartUP India' mantra to succeed and to replicate the Silicon Valley in India, one will need to attract people from other nations, provide better infrastructure and connectivity. "India missed the industrial revolution due to colonisation, but the mobile revolution should not be missed,” he said.

PTI