“You can definitely use technology in a good way and I think we will see more and more of this innovation in the future. Even in areas where the technology was previously inaccessible, I think they will feel the impact in one way or another. And going forward, I see that as a growing trend,” Raghavan told Miloni Bhatt, editor-in-chief. Digital Broadcasting Economic Times.
At the ET Soonicorns Summit, an initiative of EconomicTimes.com to celebrate India’s future league of unicorns and unlock their full potential, Kumara also discussed the important role of emerging disruptive startups in the country, including those coming from Tier 2 markets. He will play his next Test for India. “You’ll see a lot of innovation coming from these tier-two cities in artificial intelligence, climate technologies and IoT, among others. The growth of start-ups and start-up initiatives in these small towns in India is not only fruitful for startup founders and entrepreneurs, but these towns themselves are reaping huge benefits due to the developments taking place in their backyards, said Raghavan.
Fintech and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) are two areas where some of the most innovative products and solutions are being created, which will increase investor interest and investment. AWS is also excited about the amount of innovation that is happening due to artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies, Raghavan said.
Watch the ET Soonicorns Summit here:
https://events.hubilo.com/etsoonicornssummit
Find the stories of your interest
Edited quotes from the interview:
EconomicTimes.com: The pandemic forced businesses to migrate from desktop computers to cloud computing, forcing them to go digital, and now enterprises are realizing the intelligence, flexibility and improvement that the cloud offers. Can you tell us how things have changed between the pre- and post-pandemic periods in terms of how companies approach and leverage their businesses on the cloud?
Kumara Raghavan: The pandemic was a life-changing experience for all of us. As every person turns to digital means to fulfill their daily shopping needs be it groceries or educational needs, the adoption of digital services as default has been very fast. This has led businesses to move from on-premises computing to cloud-computing, supporting their rapid fuel technology-driven growth. Cloud computing has contributed greatly to the rapid pace of digitization at the global level, especially in the last two years. So the day-to-day benefits that technology offers is something we constantly see.
A market forecast reported by IDC estimates that the Indian public cloud services market will reach $13.5 billion by 2026, making India one of the fastest growing markets for public cloud services overall. Also, startups have played a major role in the adoption of cloud services in India. Everyone wants to reduce their costs, and the cloud is a great way to go about that, but the benefit really lies in the efficiency that the cloud provides.
EconomicTimes.com: Businesses have realized the importance of digital technology following the pandemic and many are investing or trying to invest in AI. Can you tell us what is the benefit of these products and any sector or industry, that you are seeing, perhaps unexpected interest in AI?
Kumara Raghavan: We are passionate about machine learning technology and so are our startup customers. India is a growing economy and we see the scope of AI and ML becoming very broad. Initially, it was used as a means to bring efficiency but now you see a huge amount of innovation happening in this area as well. Whether it’s healthcare, gaming, edtech or fintech, there’s a big push to adopt ML across verticals.
So, the way we look at AI and ML is through three layers. In the first layer, we look at the basic infrastructure needed to build AI/ML capabilities. The second layer of technology is what we call Amazon SageMaker – a fully managed machine learning service that helps data scientists and developers bring together a broad set of capabilities to develop, build, train and deploy high-quality ML models. And we have a set of ready-made offerings like Amazon Textract, which automatically extracts text, handwriting and data from scanned documents.
EconomicTimes.com: Recent data from the government shows that more than 50% of startups are from tier-II and tier-III cities. There are other trends we’ve seen in the pandemic, such as home working and the gig economy. Beyond creating demand for services and products, how do you see these trends and markets boosting India’s economic prospects?
Kumara Raghavan: India is definitely showing a very stable but very unique trend, where experienced professionals and startup founders are moving from metros to tier-2 cities. And you will see a lot of innovation coming from these tier-2 cities in artificial intelligence, climate technologies and IoT and other areas. The growth of start-ups and start-up initiatives in these small towns in India is not only fruitful for startup founders and entrepreneurs, but these towns themselves are reaping huge benefits from the developments taking place in their backyards. So it is clear that there is a very strong impetus in the startup ecosystem from Tier-2 cities. And we work with founders to ensure they have the resources to build their businesses by taking full advantage of the length and breadth of AWS services.
EconomicTimes.com: Tech is considered the key to solving many of the world’s problems. But while technology can accelerate growth, it can also exacerbate inequality. How do we drive technology for good, especially in India?
Kumara Raghavan: Businesses have realized that changing to sustainable business practices provides opportunities for new and innovative ideas. Therefore, the call for private and public sectors to collaborate on sustainable innovation is strong. The use of cloud technology is one way to achieve this.
You can definitely make good use of technology and I think we will see more and more of this innovation in the future. Even in areas where the technology was previously inaccessible, I think the impact will be felt in one way or another. And in the future, I definitely see that as a growing trend.
Watch the full interview here. You can visit the ET Soonicorns Summit website to know more about it.
Motivation.
