Sundar Pichai makes strong case for Google's return to China

Many small and medium-sized businesses in China take advantage of Google to get their products to many other countries outside of China, Pichai said

Google's India-born CEO Sundar Pichai made a strong case for the search giant's return to China, saying it is already helping Chinese companies gain global access.

Google was shut down in China in 2010 following a showdown with the government over censor policies. Since then Google, Gmail, Youtube and its other products are banned in the world's second largest economy.

"A lot of work Google does is to help Chinese companies", the 45-year-old Google CEO, who has a BTech degree from IIT Kharagpur, said at a state-run global internet conference at the Chinese city of Wuzen.

The conference was also addressed by Apple