The Start-up Cell of Karnataka Innovation and Technology Society (KITS), Dept. of Electronics, IT, BT and S&T wing of the Government of Karnataka jointly organized the inauguration ceremony for the Bengaluru Tech Summit 2020 (BTS2020) on Thursday morning with the inauguration addressed by the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi, which has instigated expectations to make contributions towards upskilling and increasing industry support in the state, a journey towards Atmanirbhar Bharat as envisioned by the PM.
Prime Minister of Australia Scott Morrison and Vice President of Swiss Confederation Guy Parmelin will also virtually be a part of the inauguration ceremony.
The BTS 2020 is themed “Now is Next” and will be held till November 21 with various speakers sharing their ideologies on technology assistance in their fields. Mr. Amit Agarwal, Global Sr. VP & Country Head, Amazon will also be a keynote speaker at the event and Amazon is one of the diamond sponsors alongside Karnataka Tourism Department for Asia’s biggest digital event. The event will be mostly virtual due to the Covid-19 pandemic. 25 countries have agreed to participate in this digital event this year.
Founder of Isha Foundation, Sadhguru will also be a speaker in the summit speaking on “Investing in Technologies for Wellbeing”.
PM Modi talked about the evolution of technologies in various departments. “Digital India has become the way of life, particularly for the poor, marginalized and for those in the government. Using tech on such a large scale has brought about several life changes for our citizens. Our governance model is a technology first model”, he said.
He further told that India has the world’s largest medical scheme Ayushman Bharat which is completely backed up by technology, enabling citizens to get access to top-quality medical support throughout India.
The PM also highlighted the importance and power of data analytics in the technology and information era. As per a report, India now has 750 million internet connections half of which were built up in the past 4 years.
The Deputy Chief Minister who also has the IT& BT wing under his control told that the summit is inaugurated for the second time by PM Modi and is expected to have a huge impact on the state, country as well as the whole BTS2020.
With the world under lockdown, technology has played an integral role in bringing the lives of people together, we haven’t sorted out everything but this event will be more of a solution to the challenges that we are facing as mankind.
The event will be a gateway of opportunities to bring in investors to Karnataka and to help reach tech-based Indian startups to reach Europe.
12 memorandums of understanding (MoU) have been signed and two will be focusing on cyber-security and agricultural issues.
The PM emphasized the fact that technology will assist us in learning and growing together and the tech industry should recognize the various opportunities that we have for great innovations.
Few key take away points from PM’s speech at the BTS2020 inauguration event:
- The power of data analytics is massive.
- Incubation centres will be opening up in India.
- India has adopted the culture of Hackathons in recent times, which encourages young minds to develop solutions to existing problems.
- Work from anywhere is the new normal.
- Education, Health and Retail industries will be seeing tech adaption in the future.
- Technology is and will be redefining the Defence sector.
- Cyber-security solutions will be developed.
- Products can be made by anyone and anytime in the information era.
The event includes 200 Indian companies, 270 speakers, 4000 delegates and 75 panels with almost 50,000 visitors are expected to participate each day. Companies will get a better understanding of the emerging technologies in their field and have a window for widespread exposure.
PM’s Speech:
