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4th US-India Conference
Friday, 27 September, 2019
Spieker Forum, UC Berkeley Campus

AIMA jointly with Haas School of Business, University of Berkeley, California and the Consulate General of India in San Francisco organised the 4th US-India Conference on 27th September 2019 at Spieker Forum, UC Berkeley Campus. The conference was also supported by the Institute for South Asia Studies, UC Berkeley; the Bay Area Council; TiE Silicon Valley; US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF); and the India Community Center. Top executives and government & academic leaders from both countries explored areas for greater collaboration. Delivering the keynote address, Mr Conrad Sangma, Chief Minister, Government of Meghalaya invited American companies to invest in the state. He told the audience about the ongoing transformation of the state’s agrarian economy into a tech-driven services economy.

Mr Sanjay Kirloskar, President, AIMA and Chairman and Managing Director, Kirloskar Brothers, stressed on the need to create new rules of international ties and renew trust in institutions. Mr Sunil Kant Munjal, Conference Chairman and Chairman, Hero Enterprise, drew attention to the ongoing efforts to sign a free trade agreement between the two countries.

Mr Sanjay Panda, Consul General of India, San Francisco, gave a special address and highlighted India's efforts to become a $5 trillion economy in the next five years. Ms Carol Christ, Chancellor, University of California, Berkeley delivered the welcome address which was followed by introductory remarks by Ms Rekha Sethi, Director General, AIMA. Mr Munis D Faruqui, Director, Institute for South Asia Studies, Sarah Kailath Chair of India Studies, University of California, Berkeley, presented the vote of thanks and Mr Solomon Darwin, Executive Director, Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation, Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, presented the concluding remarks.

Mr Sunil Kant Munjal in conversation with Mr Paul Saffo, Technology Forecaster and Consulting Associate Professor, Stanford University, discussed how the shift to exponential technologies will unnerve incumbents and create vast new opportunities.

Some of the other eminent speakers who addressed the daylong conference included Mr T V Mohandas Pai, Chairman, Manipal Global Education Services; Mr Henry Chesbrough, Faculty Director, Garwood Center for Corporate Innovation, Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley; Mr Richard Lyons, Former Dean, Haas School of Business, and William and Janet Cronk Chair in Innovative Leadership, University of California, Berkeley; Mr R Mukundan, Managing Director and CEO, Tata Chemicals Ltd; Mr Sandeep Kishore, CEO & MD, Zensar Technologies & Management Board Member, RPG Enterprises; Mr Ganesh Iyer, Edgar F. Kaiser, Professor of Business Administration, Hass School of Business, University of California, Berkeley; Mr Mukesh Aghi, President and CEO, US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF); Mr Ganesh V Iyer, Managing Director, NIO USA and Global CIO, NIO; Mr Thomas Y Lee, Director of Data Science, Fisher Center for Business Analytics, Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley; Mr Stratos Nguyen Davlos, CTO & Sr Vice President, Innoplexus AG; Mr Soma Velayutham, Head of Industry Business Development and AI Deep Learning, NVIDIA; Mr Charlie Isaacs, CTO - Customer Connection, Salesforce; Mr Vas Bhandarkar, CEO & Cofounder, ScoreData Corporation; Mr Atiq Raza, Chairman & CEO, Virsec Systems Inc.; Ms Kaval Kaur, CFO and Co-founder, AlertEnterprise Inc.; Mr Ashu Garg, General Partner, Foundation Capital; Mr Vineet Gulati, Founder & CEO, Payssurance; Mr Ashwani Rishi, Executive Vice President, Virtusa Corp and Ms Catherine Wolfram, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Cora Jane Flood Professor of Business Administration, Berkeley Haas, Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley

The conference drew nearly 200 delegates including Indian CEOs, entrepreneurs and technologists from Silicon Valley, and students and faculty of Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley.