EMERGING TECHNOLOGY CONFERENCE FOCUSES ON ADAPTATION, NOT INNOVATION

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 NEW DELHI 000941 STATE FOR OES/PCI, OES/STC, OES/SAT, OES/EGC, AND SCA/INS STATE FOR STAS STATE PASS TO NSF FOR INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMS HHS PASS TO NIH STATE PASS TO USAID STATE FOR SCA, OES (STAS FEDOROFF); OES/PDAS/RHARNISH; OES/PCI STEWART; OES/IHB MURPHY; OES/GTHOMPSON STATE FOR EEB/DAVID HENRY PASS TO MAS/DAS/JESTRADA PASS TO MAC/DAS/HVINEYARD PASS TO NSF/MLUECK SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: TSPL TBIO TNGD TPHY EINV SIPR TINT SCUL ECPS IN SUBJECT: EMERGING TECHNOLOGY CONFERENCE FOCUSES ON ADAPTATION, NOT INNOVATION ¶1. SUMMARY: EmTech India '09 was MIT Technology Review's first ever emerging technology conference held outside the U.S. The conference was billed as a forum to discuss technological trends and showcase India's latest cutting edge technologies in information and communications technology, clean and green technologies, nanotechnology, biotechnology and homeland security. Instead, the conference focused on technology adaptation and investment opportunities to serve the most impoverished 800 million Indians - collectively known as the bottom of the pyramid (BOP.) The conference also launched the Indian edition of MIT's Technology Review in collaboration with Indian technology publisher CyberMedia. Mr. Jason Pontin, Editor-in chief of MIT's Technology Review, said India was chosen for the new magazine and conference because MIT saw a growing trend of Indian origin innovators identifying ideas in the U.S. then setting up enterprises in India, and also because of India's development of inexpensive and innovative technologies focused on the emerging lower-end of the market. END SUMMARY MICRO ENTREPRENEURS AND VENTURE CAPITALISTS ¶2. Prof. Anil K. Gupta from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and also Executive Vice Chairperson of the National Innovation Foundation (NIF),said that the NIF helps catalogue, facilitate value addition, and market technologies developed by rural entrepreneurs. In the last 2 years, rural innovators had registered over 100,000 inexpensive innovations which address specific needs of the rural community but require funding and technical support to develop into useful products. Some of the examples he gave were: -- A water tap that generates electricity through flowing water. -- A foldable lightweight ladder-type device. -- A bicycle which is both an exercise bike and washing machine. ¶3. Other BOP-market technologies discussed by multinationals during the conference included: -- An add-on device for mobile phone-processing of secure transactions. Mr. Sanjay Swamy, CEO, mChek, said that this had enabled over 2 million rural people and small businesses to pay their bills via mobile phone and thus save time and money. -- A Global Positioning System based, tamper-proof Auto Rickshaw (three wheeler)/Taxi fare meter developed by students at Indraprastha University, Delhi and partly funded by HP. -- A technology to create a national identity number for all Indians linked to their mobile phone, being developed by Alcatel Lucent in collaboration with the Government of India (GOI). -- An enterprise management system developed by Microsoft in collaboration with the GOI, and used by an industrial cluster of 5000 textile units to manage their operations and supply chains. -- A voice web technology being developed for the rural community which does not require computer literacy and can be implemented in any language. Developed by IBM India, this technology has been tested in villages in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. The opportunity to use voice rather than written characters is particularly appealing in a country where so many languages are spoken and a large percentage of the population is illiterate. NEW DELHI 00000941 002 OF 004 -- A light and strong fiber-based material for making fishing nets for rural fisherman developed by Honeywell. ¶4. In 2008, venture capitalists from the US, India and other international groups invested USD 864 million in 80 deals in India in business and financial services, IT related technologies, energy & utilities, and biotechnology. Sateesh Andra, venture partner of Draper Fisher Jurvetson India, said that besides IT and healthcare, rural and education sectors were the emerging areas of interest to venture capitalists, and that the biggest challenge was in reaching out to the BOP market. Aruna Sundararajan, CEO of Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS) said that to reach out to the BOP market it was very important to have a proper marriage between technology and business innovation. Both emphasized looking at a five to seven year cycle when investing in this market. ICT FERTILE GROUND FOR INDIAN INNOVATION ¶5. Information and communication technology (ICT) dominated the conference, with nearly every session referencing ICT in some way. Many of the discussions revolved around ICT-enabled software and hardware run from mobile technology which is being used in education, health care, e-governance, banking, traffic management and homeland security. Indian companies including Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Tuple Technologies, Iridium Interactive and Wipro, as well as US companies IBM, Intel, HP, Yahoo, Texas Instrument, Freescale Semiconductor, and Microsoft, all identified their interest in developing this technology and indicated only the tip of the iceberg was discussed during the conference. ¶6. Most speakers felt that India was ahead of the curve in maximizing the advantages of mobile technologies - partly from a lack of adequate bandwidth and connectivity infrastructure for conventional technology, and partly from the accelerated spread of inexpensive mobile phones in India. A United Nations Development Program 2005 report notes that India has higher mobile phone literacy (82 percent) than it does Internet literacy (55 percent). HEALTH CARE AND EDUCATION ¶7. Health care and both formal and informal education were identified as growth areas in India, since a majority of the people still have no access and/or cannot afford them. Dr. Reddy, the founder and chairman of Apollo hospitals, talked about using telemedicine to connect specialty hospitals with other specialists, individual doctors in suburban areas, and rural health centers in order to deliver affordable and quality health care. He said Apollo was actively engaged with more than 2000 villages. Wipro, Tuple Technologies, Hindustan Computers limited, and Infosys, as well as small and medium entrepreneurs associated with academic institutions and US companies like Intel, Texas Instruments, HP and Agilent are also working to address this market. In the Eleventh Five year Plan (2007-2012),the GOI initiated a mission to develop inexpensive medical instruments and tools to facilitate telemedicine-based services and the Indian Space Research Organization has ongoing programs with Indian educational institutions to develop telemedicine and teleeducation capabilities. ¶8. To reach the large number of undereducated children, several organizations focused on innovative education delivery technologies, including: NEW DELHI 00000941 003 OF 004 -- The "One Laptop Per Child" project, a part of the GOI's "Sakshat" education program. -- Mobile phone based education delivery in villages by Value Based Skill Academy, run in Western Uttar Pradesh by entrepreneur Bijender Khokhar. -- IT buses in rural India that provide mobile computing classrooms to spread IT literacy among rural school students. -- The Indira Soochna Shakti - "Empowering a quarter million schoolgirls through ICT" project in Chhattisgarh, India CLEAN ENERGY AND GREEN TRANSPORTATION ¶9. Lack of appropriate panelists hampered any meaningful discussion on clean energy and green transportation, though it was allocated multiple sessions in the conference. A recurrent theme was the need for clearer guidance from government; the panelists felt that development of infrastructure was required before any new technologies - such as biofuels, electric vehicles or solar energy - would be effective. Panelists noted that REVA was India's only electric car manufacturer, and the hybrid car market in India was virtually nonexistent. NANOTECHNOLOGY AND BIOTECHNOLOGY ¶10. The GOI is investing heavily in funding and capacity building for both nanotechnology (REFTEL A) and biotechnology, and panelists believed that the recent increases in GOI funding were starting to show. Agilent technologies mentioned that in 2008 they sold more than 25 Atomic Force Microscopes to Indian academic and R&D institutions - a huge jump from previous years. Prof. Vijay Chandru, Chairman and CEO, Strand Life Sciences, said that India was poised to be a leader in not just data generation but also interpretation, and highlighted the example of Strand's developments in virtual organ models and a gene sequencing platform called "Genespring." He claimed it was the world's largest and cost only USD 5,000, compared to a similar system that cost USD 3 billion in ¶2003. (NOTE: The purchase of additional equipment does suggest expansion of programs. However, the actual qualitative impact of the increased funding is less clear and does not appear to be uniform across government and academic institutions, due in part to a shortage of qualified SCIENTISTS and professors. END NOTE) ¶11. Dr. M. K. Bhan, Secretary of the GOI's Department of Biotechnology, listed India's biotechnology priorities as genetics, vaccines, diagnosis and imaging, low cost health technology, agriculture and energy. Challenges India is facing right now include an unfavorable investment climate, a shortage of 500-600 scientific leaders in both industry and government, and need for a long-term outlook and sustained funding for both private and government labs. Highlighting the drug industry, Dr Bhan indicated that India's regulatory system was weak and that when industry regulation improved and drug companies started doing their job on the regulatory front, costs for medications would probably increase 10 fold. HOMELAND SECURITY DISCUSSION A NONSTARTER ¶12. In the light of the Mumbai attacks, we expected good NEW DELHI 00000941 004 OF 004 discussions in the homeland security technology session. However, the panel did not include any GOI personnel currently associated with homeland security, and the conversations were light on substance. Mr. Nath, former Special Director of Intelligence Bureau and currently CEO of the Indian Institute of Security & Safety Management, said that the GOI lacked a policy for homeland security and more importantly both the GOI and the private sector had yet to accept the need for and invest in security. Tuple Technologies, Honeywell, and HP mentioned that they were working with the GOI to develop smart sensors, data mining systems, image processing and other ICT-enabled services to address the homeland security related issues, but did not provide details. ¶13. COMMENT: Very little truly emergent technology was discussed at the conference, which focused more on adapting existing technologies into low-cost and accessible products for the impoverished 800 million people that have not benefited from India's recent accelerated growth. Only half of the initial list of companies and invitees attended the conference and several sessions lacked quality panelists. Attendance by venture capitalists and the relatively stronger business presence suggest commercial interest in emerging opportunities in India's technology market. END COMMENT. BURLEIGH