STPI has launched several initiatives including Centres of Entrepreneurship and Next Generation Incubation Scheme to foster tech startups focused on emerging technologies.
Aligned with the vision of the government for achieving $1 trillion economy, STPI has launched several initiatives including Centres of Entrepreneurship (CoEs) and Next Generation Incubation Scheme (NGIS) to foster tech startups focused on emerging technologies by providing them with a robust collaborative platform to realise their unique ideas into path-breaking technology products both in software and hardware domains, Arvind Kumar, Director General, Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), tells Arpit Gupta in an interaction with ETGovernment.
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How can India become Atmanirbhar in emerging technologies and new age devices? What should be the roadmap for a trillion-dollar digital economy?
The government has been playing a transformational role in formulating futuristic reforms to make India Atmanirbhar. The flagship initiatives like Make in India and PLI schemes for the manufacturing sector can catalyse India’s economic growth by attracting FDI, strengthening the domestic manufacturing ecosystem, boosting exports, and creating immense employment opportunities for the skilled talent pool. The recently launched Rs 76,000 crore PLI scheme for the semiconductor manufacturing and the total fiscal support of Rs 2,30,000 crore for the entire ESDM supply chain can significantly galvanise the electronics manufacturing ecosystem and push India to rise above the ESDM value chain.
The HSDC Scheme proposed at an estimated outlay of around Rs 10,500 crore is expected to augment additional capacity of 2000 MW (which denotes the amount of energy consumed in a data centre and eventually marks the capacity of the data centre) by 2027. This will make India a Global Data Centre Hub. Support initiative of making Aatmanirbhar Bharat by promoting indigenous products in Data Centre space is projected to attract Rs 3.52 lakh crore and generate around 1.2 lakh direct and indirect jobs.
The Digital India Infoway - “The Network of Networks” is expected to be the next generation secure network with high speed, redundancy, robust architecture & security, continuously updated with emerging technologies and would be a high-end multi-tier, multi-technology research, education and eGovernance network.
The National Language Translation Mission launched by the government can play a pivotal role in large scale translation from English to Indian languages and vice versa by enhancing digital inclusion across linguistic diversities. Speech to Speech and Text to Text Machine Translation systems for major Indian languages will help faster localization of technologies and boost inclusion.
Prime Minister’s vision for “One Nation, One Digital Platform” has resulted in the initiation of several public digital platforms including National Digital Health Platform, National Digital Education Architecture, National Digital Agriculture Platform, and Future Skills PRIME / Online Education. These platforms will further boost the digital economy.
Could you share some of the key initiatives of STPI which will enable achieve the trillion-dollar digital economy goal?
Aligned with the vision of the government for achieving $1 trillion economy, STPI has also launched several initiatives such as Centres of Entrepreneurship (CoEs) and Next Generation Incubation Scheme (NGIS) to foster tech startups focused on emerging technologies by providing them with a robust collaborative platform to realize their unique ideas into path-breaking technology products both in software and hardware domains.
Till date, STPI has launched 20 CoEs in emerging technologies including, but not limited to AI, IoT, Big Data, Blockchain, etc. Such initiatives can further revolutionize the tech startup ecosystem in the country and accelerate innovation-led entrepreneurship in the country, which will further help in contributing to the vision of a $1 trillion economy.
India has already achieved global laurels in the software services field. Time is opportune for India to focus on products, semiconductor design, electronics system design, innovations in emerging technology domains, and unify platforms for delivery of government services to the citizenry to become a $1 trillion digital economy during the next five years.
What challenges do you see in the next era of digital India and smart governance and taking it to the last mile? What is the way forward to digitally empower India to make it more resilient, competitive, and future-ready?
Over the last few years India is witnessing a transformation in its digital footprint and governance. The government has undertaken several path-breaking initiatives like Digital India to expand the digital footprint of the country while delivering citizen-centric services. India stacks such as AADHAAR and UPI have played a major role in boosting digital adoption in the country. Let me share some numbers. These numbers itself speaks a lot about the digital profile of India.
According to a report published by TRAI in August 2021, the total number of internet subscribers in India has gone up to 82.5 crore. UPI recorded 461 crore transactions in January 2022, which is 1% higher than the 456 crore transactions recorded in December 2021. The transaction volume has also increased by 1% from Rs 8.26 lakh crore to Rs 8.31 lakh crore. Direct Transfer Benefit (DBT) to citizens has been leveraging the AADHAR-based money transfer to the bank accounts of citizens. Today, India has the largest number of digital identities i.e., 132.4 crore AADHAAR card holders. Since April 1, 2021, over Rs 4.53 lakh crore has been provided to the beneficiaries under the DBT through 544 crore transactions. 150+ applications leverage AADHAAR authentication services. 4.47 lakh Common Services Centres (CSCs) of which 3.48 lakh CSCs are at Gram Panchayat level are taking 380+ government services to the locality of villagers.
Although a lot of challenges are solved however challenges like digital divide, digital fraud and data privacy needs to be addressed further.
While the government has been doing its bit to expand digital and financial inclusion at the grassroots, it’s essential to bridge the digital divide between urban and rural populations. During the pandemic lockdown, most of the students living in remote areas of the country could not access the digital classes because of unavailability of devices and connectivity. At this juncture, the tech industry and startups must think about building disruptive innovations to enhance affordability of tech products & services and empower the people living at the bottom of the economic pyramid to access the facilities easily.
What’s concerning now is the growing instances of cyberthreats and digital frauds as we move forwards with digital adoption. We must think about building robust digital infrastructure with the highest level of security standards to keep the digital revolution leaping forward.
Another critical factor is data protection. Data has enormous economic value. We need new modes to protect data and privacy in the realm of a hyperconnected world. We should keep upgrading our existing platforms and build new platforms and solutions driven by Blockchain and other cutting-edge technologies to ensure trust, transparency, traceability, and security of digital information.
COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of technology. How has the industry used technologies like AI/ML, Blockchain, AR/VR, IoT and Cloud and other technology-based applications to mitigate the pandemic challenge?
Pandemic brought disruptions across all aspects of life; however, the Indian technology industry left no stone unturned to meet the exigency of contemporary requirements. Almost all the technology-based solutions and products have used emerging technologies such as AI, ML, IoT, Cloud, AR/VR etc. to bring breakthrough innovations.
First, as you know companies faced challenges in the physical ecosystem and shifted to work from home models. Now the entire work environment went digital by using cloud-based products and solutions. The change realized on ground was earlier unthinkable and most of the companies were even not in favour of considering work from home a viable option for running operations in a seamless manner. This new normal is going to be a practice even in the post-pandemic period.
Second, industry started a wide range of solutions like touchless transactions and sensor-powered sanitization and technologies that helped industries in different verticals to continue their operations and deliver services & products to the customers.
This pandemic has given impetus to the technology adoption which otherwise might have taken many more years to reach this level. What’s essentially required now is to focus on digital inclusion and digital accessibility to democratise the adoption of technology across the demographics. The legacy of the Indian IT industry, growing tech-entrepreneurial ecosystem, and rising tech startups can play a pivotal role in boosting India’s technology evolution by creating patents and building products for India and the world, making India a technology product nation.
