America
Modi meets Satya Nadella, Sundar Pichai in Silicon Valley
San Jose (California), Sep 27
Prime Minister
Narendra Modi on a whirlwind tour of Silicon Valley met America's top
tech leaders including Microsoft's Satya Nadella, Google's Sundar
Pichai, and Apple's Tim Cook before heading for a digital economy dinner
with 350 business leaders.
Modi, who is here to give a strong
push to his drive for technological innovation in India, also met
Adobe's Shantanu Narayen, Qualcomm's Paul Jacobs, Cisco's John Chambers
and The Indus entrepreneurs president Venkatesh Shukla.
"We have a unique tie with India. Our founder Steve Jobs went to India for inspiration," Cook told the prime minister.
Modi
also visited the Tesla Motors plant in Palo Alto, California to see the
path-breaking inventions on renewable energy made by the makers of
trend-setting electric cars.
He was given a tour by Tesla CEO
Elon Musk. "Prime Minister Modi and I talked about electricity
generation and how there are ways to skip ahead with it as with
cellphones," Musk, also the company's principal engineer, inventor and
investor, said later.
"Engines of the future. PM @narendramodi
takes a tour of @TeslaMotors, leading builder of electric cars,"
tweeted External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup.
With
many an Indian at the forefront of innovation in the Silicon Valley,
Modi will be looking at how to maximise opportunities at the digital
economy dinner.
Several Indian-American tech leaders as also
Cisco Chairman John Chambers, and Qualcomm Chairman Paul Jacobs among
others are attending.
Modi began his tour of Silicon Valley with
an interaction with the Indian-American community at the Imperial
Ballroom of Hotel Fairmont here.
Singer Kailash Kher met Modi and
a woman tied a rakhi to him during the interaction. Members of the Sikh
and Gujarati community also met him later.
Earlier on arrival
at the Norman Y. Minte San Jose International Airport, he was given a
red carpet welcome with San Jose mayor Sam Liccardo and his wife
receiving him.
An enthusiastic crowd of supporters was on hand to
welcome him amid chants of "Modi Modi" as he alighted from the Air
India One aircraft greeting them with a Namaste.
Amid tight security and barricading, fans reached out to the prime minister for handshakes and autographs.
Many
wearing tricolour scarves and waving paper Indian flags held aloft
signs saying "We Support Digital India." There were also banners saying
"USA loves India".