Alphabet Inc-owned Internet giant Google will be setting up its Global Fintech Operations Centre at GIFT City in Gujarat, its CEO Sundar Pichai said on Friday post meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Sundar Pichai also said that Google continues to invest in the country through its $10 billion which accounts for roughly Rs 81,980 crore India Digitisation Fund. Indian PM Narendra Modi has been on a state visit to the United States from June 21 to June 24 where he met his American counterpart, President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden. Besides the CEO of Google PM also met the CEO of Microsoft Satya Nadella, the CEO of Apple Tim Cook, the CEO of ChatGPT’s parent firm OpenAI Sam Altman and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
Pichai in his statement said, “Today we are announcing the opening of our global fintech operations Centre in GIFT City, Gujarat. It will cement India’s fintech leadership thanks to UPI and Aadhar. We are going to build on that foundation and take it globally.” Pichai also shared his excitement on looking the progress of India over the years, particularly around Digital India and economic opportunities.
Pichai met PM Modi in December and shared that Google aims to invest $10 billion in India Digitisation Fund and continue to invest in companies working on Artificial Intelligence. He also said that Prime Minister’s vision of Digital India is ahead of its time and blueprint for other countries.
The Ministry of External Affairs in its tweet highlighted the meeting between PM Modi and Google CEO Pichai and laid emphasis on productive discussions on topics like AI, Fintech and cybersecurity. There will also be collaboration between Academic Institutions and Google to enhance research, development and skill enhancement.
Google announced collaboration with Bangalore based Indian Institute of Science to collect speech data from 773 districts in the country to fine tune its translation and search technology. it also announced grant of $1 million in setting up India’s first responsible artificial intelligence Centre at IIT Madras.
