Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP) in collaboration with The GAIN accelerator recently organised the Bengaluru Meet of G20 Digital Innovation Alliance for digital startups and innovators.

Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India has launched a flagship G20 Digital Innovation Alliance (G20-DIA) to recognise and support innovators with digital solutions for various world economies under India’s G20 presidency. MeitY has chosen the six themes which are of critical significance for global communities. These themes are: Health-tech, Ed-tech, Agri-tech, Fin-tech, Secured Digital Infrastructure, and Circular Economy.

The Bengaluru Meet aptly themed as ‘driving digital innovation for world economies’ saw active participation by top government officials, global stakeholders and diplomats, corporate leaders and 300+ attendees from the thriving digital startup community in Karnataka.

The event was inaugurated by Dr EV Ramana Reddy, ACS, Department of IT, BT & S&T, Govt of Karnataka (GoK). In his inaugural speech, he spoke of Karnataka’s strong digital innovation culture, track record and the GoK push for Digital India through proactive policymaking which have catapulted Bengaluru to the global top 8 startup ecosystem stage.

Dr Taslimarif Saiyed, Director & CEO, co-host C-CAMP said, “Many in India still do not have access to the best healthcare available in the country, a problem where digital health can change the narrative. C-CAMP has a portfolio of over 70 deep tech digital health startups and we foresee digitalisation to make healthcare accessible even in remote areas affected by challenges like lack of expertise, timely intervention and infrastructure.”

As an event under India’s G20 presidency with the theme of One Earth. One Family and One Future, the Meet included two panel discussions. The first one on ‘Framework to support innovative startups through strategic collaboration across G20 nations’ was moderated by Dr Saiyed, with eminent panellists, Jonas Brunschwig, Consul General of Switzerland & CEO, Swissnex, Dr Subi Chaturvedi, Chief Corporate Affairs and Public Policy Officer, InMobi, Ashok Chandavarkar, Director, Strategic Initiatives, Intel India, Suhas Gopinath, Founder & CEO, Global Inc, and Dr Amith Singhee, Director & CTO, IBM Research India.

The second panel discussion on ‘Catalysing digital transformation in Tier 2 & 3 cities’ moderated by co-host Varad Rajan Krishna, The GAIN included industry veterans Dr Ravi Bhardwaj, Sr. Director, Product Development, GE Healthcare and Dr CM Patil, CEO, Krishi Kalpa, Siddhartha Anand, Vice President, KDEM as well as promising young entrepreneurs from startups, Dozee Health, Spotsense and Giftolexia.

The key takeaways from the panel discussions were, (1) how a Digital India has boosted global innovation ecosystem with countries in the Global North like Switzerland viewing India as a knowledge capital and not just a large market, (2) how Govt support for Digitalisation is driving impact at the national scale for otherwise Tier 1 innovators for business expansions in Tier 2 and 3 geographies.