Interactive Session on ‘Digitizing India’ with Rajan Anandan, VP & MD, Google India

FLO organised an interactive session on ‘Digitising India ‘ with Mr Rajan Anandan, Vice President & Managing Director, Google on August 12, 2014 at FICCI.

In her welcome remarks, Neeta Boochra President FLO said , ” In conjunction with the theme of the year ‘Educate & Empower’ , the session has been conceptualised with the objective to Educate ourselves on the impacts of Digitisation and at the same time, empower and equip ourselves with the knowledge pertaining to it”.

The session was very enriching and informative, with Mr Anandan updating us on various initiatives taken up by Google to widen the scope of digitisation globally, with special focus on the Indian scenario.

“Digitisation process is exhilarating, impacting and connecting. It is amazing to see how fact technology is impacting our lives. Reaching 1bn users takes half as long with each new technology,” said Mr Anandan in his address. He further added that by the year 2020, internet users will reach to a whopping 5bn, with 40-50bn smartphones from a figure of 2.8bn people and 1.75bn smartphone users in 2014. In India, the growth rate is phenomenal, which is expected to reach a user rate of 500 million by 2018, from 200 Million in 2013, with 5 Million users added every month.

Mr Anandan talked about Google Glass, which is a type of wearable technology, developed by Google with the mission of producing a mass-market ubiquitous computer, displaying information in a smartphone-like hands-free form. This device is available in USA but as of now is not available in India. ‘Project Chauffeur- Google Self Driving Car’ is another wonder of technology, made possible by Google.

He also highlighted that Google launched a campaign called ‘Helping Women Get Online’ to encourage more women to use the internet and reap its benefits. “Only one-third of Internet users are female. This needs to change to achieve the desired goal of women empowerment”, he stated.

Ms Archana Garodia, Sr. Vice President FLO, in her vote of thanks said that the transformational ability of digitisation should be leveraged to promote entrepreneurship and help bridging the gap in the lesser connected areas.

The invaluable support of Ms Ritu Vadhera, Governing body member FLO, who also hosted the lunch.