Tech titans endorse Modi's 'Digital India' vision

Google CEO Sundar Pichai calls India one of the fastest growing 'startups' in the world

Prime Minister Narendra Modi began a two-day trip to Silicon Valley on Saturday with a visit to "green" car maker Tesla Motors Inc and a meeting with Apple Inc's CEO, Tim Cook.

Modi, 65, the first Indian leader to visit the US West Coast in more than 30 years, also met Indian-born CEOs Satya Nadella and Sundar Pichai of Microsoft Corp and Google Inc, respectively, before a dinner with 350 business leaders.

His trip follows a US visit by China's president, Xi Jinping, who met with several tech leaders in Seattle earlier this week.

Hardselling 'Digital India', Modi said it is "an enterprise for India's transformation on a scale that is, perhaps, unmatched in human history." 

"I want our 1.25 billion citizens to be digitally connected," Modi said before a gathering of Silicon Valley CEOs, who endorsed the 'Digital India' initiative.

"Digital India will bring about solutions for the challenge of digital divide," said Nadella, who took over as Microsoft CEO last year, at a dinner interaction with Modi. Nadella said that next week Microsoft will announce cloud computing from data centers in India.

Modi has accelerated effort to make India the next driver in innovation, said Sunder Pichai, CEO of Google, calling India one of the fastest growing 'startups' in the world. 

"We are proud of what is happening in India and share Prime Minister's vision of Digital India," he said. 

Modi in his speech, said, "We will connect all schools and colleges with broadband. Building I-ways are as important as highways."

"We are expanding our public Wi-Fi hotspots. For example, we want to ensure that free Wi-Fi is not only there in airport lounges, but also on our railway platforms. Teaming up with Google, we will cover 500 railway stations in a short time," the Prime Minister told the gathering.

Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayan said that the Digital India initiative would "transform India into a digitally empowered" knowledge economy. 

John Chambers, CEO of Cisco endorsed Digital India, saying it has the potential to bring about great changes in India. The US and India would be "very strong together under your (Modi's) leadership", he added. 

Paul Jacobs executive chairman of Qualcomm announced $150 million funds to fuel innovation in Indian startups. He also announced Design India initiative and labs, saying it would help the 'Make in India' program. 

At Tesla, Modi met with Chief Executive Elon Musk and discussed renewable energy, which Modi is eager to bring back to India.

Modi hopes to attract funds and skills from US innovators to help India's burgeoning startup scene.