India likely to remain fastest-growing economy for next few years: FM

In her ongoing visit to the US, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said India is likely to remain the world’s fastest-growing major economy over the next few years. Sitharaman interacted with business leaders and investors in San Francisco in a roundtable on Monday, which was organised by the US India Business Council and CII. The FM also interacted with industry leaders in the semiconductor sector and renewable energy sector and held deliberations on the investment opportunities that India offers in these emerging sectors.

Stressing that India is likely to remain the world’s fastest-growing major economy over the next few years, Sitharaman urged the participants of the USIBC-CII roundtable to become a part of the India growth story. “The roundtable was attended by senior executives, private sector business leaders, venture capitalists, institutional investors, and representatives of pension and endowment funds, representing combined assets under management of over $1 trillion,” the finance ministry tweets.

On the sidelines of the roundtables, FM met top global CEOs during her visit. Uber CEO Mr Dara Khosrowshahi, FirstSolar CEO Mark Widmar, Western Digital Senior VP Dan Steere held interactions with the finance minister. Widmer and Sitharaman interacted on India’s renewable energy landscape and FirstSolar’s $700 million investment in India, the ministry adds. “Widmar informed FM @nsitharaman that @FirstSolar India plant will be operational shortly and this is their lowest-cost factory across jurisdictions with very low carbon footprint and recycles 90% of the material,” it adds.

During the interaction, Dan Steere said the company is excited to explore the possibility of expanding manufacturing in India, while Uber’s Khosrowshahi told the FM that the mobility giant is “positively confident” of quadrupling the Uber growth in India, with the investment made in the backend to support expansion.

Later, the FM participated in the roundtable with industry leaders from the semiconductor ecosystem, including design, manufacturing, equipment, technology and systems, in San Francisco. “FM spoke of the opportunities for companies situated in Silicon Valley for the entire semiconductor value chain and government of India’s commitment to be a reliable player in the entire value chain with a dedicated incentive for the sector in #MissionMode through Indian Semiconductor Mission,” the ministry tweets.

On the sidelines of the meeting, FM interacted with Devinder Kumar, chief financial officer and treasurer of AMD, Microsoft Corporate vice-president for Azure Hardware Systems and Infrastructure Rani N Borkar, and Manish Bhatia, executive vice president of global operations at Micron Technology.

“The participants also mentioned that in view of global supply chain disruptions, they need to review overreliance of the supply chain in certain jurisdictions and with the right policies and talent in place, next decade will belong to India,” says the ministry.

The Finance Minister also participated in a roundtable meeting with venture capital and private equity investors in the clean energy sector. The discussion covered the potential for generating clean energy in India, energy alternatives, waste-to-energy, green steel, and carbon capture, among others.