Modi, NVIDIA CEO strategise on India’s AI potential amid tech boom
Leaders discuss India's role in global AI amidst expanding tech infrastructure
Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, recently met with Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA, at 7 Lok Kalyan Marg, New Delhi, the prime minister’s official residence. The meeting took place in the backdrop of Modi’s preparation for the upcoming G20 summit, where he is set to host global leaders including US President Joe Biden.
Modi and Huang engaged in a comprehensive discussion around India’s potential in the artificial intelligence (AI) sector. This event marks their second meeting, casting the spotlight on NVIDIA’s significant role in India’s burgeoning tech industry.
India recently made headlines by being the first nation to successfully land on the Moon’s south pole, exemplifying the growing technological prowess of the world’s largest democracy. Post his meeting with Modi, Huang further convened with several researchers from global tech and science powerhouses, such as the Indian Institute of Science and the Indian Institute of Technology, over an informal dinner.
These attendees represented an impressive assortment of talents in diverse fields such as large language models, astrophysics, medicine, quantum computing, and natural language processing. The conversation spanned across diverse topics including the use of technology to tackle language barriers, enhance agricultural productivity, bridge healthcare service gaps, and transform digital economies, alongside addressing some of the major scientific challenges of our times.
NVIDIA has long-standing ties with India, having commenced operations in Bangalore back in 2004. Today, the country houses four of NVIDIA’s engineering development centers, located in Gurugram, Hyderabad, Pune, and Bengaluru, employing over 3,800 individuals. NVIDIA’s developer program boasts of over 320,000 Indian developers, with the company’s CUDA parallel programming platform seeing approximately 40,000 downloads every month in India alone.
These developments come amid the Indian government’s ongoing efforts to bolster the nation’s IT infrastructure. It is anticipated that a compute grid will soon connect 20 cities across India, facilitating efficient collaboration and data sharing among researchers and scientists.
Modi has set ambitious targets for India’s economic development, aiming for the country to become the world’s third-largest economy by 2030 – it currently stands fifth. Furthermore, by 2047, the centenary year of India’s independence, the country is expected to join the league of developed economies.
