FROM THE EDITOR

The Rise of the Technology Age

2020 – the year of the pandemic has figuratively set the world spinning in reverse. Hurricanes, floods, extreme temperatures, deadly forest fires, and towering above all these climate disasters is COVID-19. It showed out the inadequate efforts of global leaders to cut back on emission. The Paris Agreement of five years, for example, together with the International Solar Alliance, seeks to restrict global heating below 2oC at the end of this century, is in poor shape and not on track to meet even its modest commitments. It is apparent that relying merely on the Paris Agreement will not limit warming. The approach needs to be more inclusive. World over, nations need to take up climate trade policies and thereby seek to make their imports meet their environmental obligations. Together, we first need a deep understanding of implications of a green transition and prepare a benchmark for environmentally friendly technologies and behavior. The world is moving out of the Industrial Age where increased growth meant increased emissions or the more you pollute the more you grow. Coronavirus has fast tracked us into a new age of AI, of sustainable digital technology. Today, it is possible to make progress and grow, at a lesser pace of emission as the cost of renewable energy, storage, smart grids are swiftly becoming cost competitive Ashok Thakur Chief Editor – ETN athakur@ces-ltd.com with fossil fuel technology. The world is no more competing for a finite energy resource, and should come together to make an abundance of energy that is affordable and accessible to all. A global country wide effort would hasten this process. Software is becoming central to all industries, and enterprises are undergoing a transformation to digital. The new age brings a prospect of energy for all, along with work for all; there are tremendous opportunities in the areas of skilling, R&D, ecosystem connects, life science and bio technology, smart manufacturing, smart agriculture, smart health, aerospace and defense, online education, sports economy and automotive – to name just a few. Robotics and Tech Parks are frontier areas of technology in India and will receive focus in the soon to be released Science, Technology and Innovation Policy 2020. Sound environmental In the shift to AI and software adoption, three digital technologies - cloud computing, cyber security and big data analytics - are at the heart of this policies can transformation. Cloud is no more back-end storage, but has moved to become make sound front-end technology, enabling on demand access to resources, flexibility in scaling, cost reduction and much more. NITI Aayog along with AWS (Amazon economic policies Web Services) has announced the launch of the Frontier Technologies Cloud Innovation Center. CIC is a public-private partnership to address societal challenges through digital innovation. India is emerging as a software-as-a-service hub and boasts 1000 plus SaaS companies, of which 150 have revenues of more than $1million. India’s small and medium business SMBs offer a huge untapped opportunity. Lower down the rung, MSMEs are to become technology resource centers through an accelerated implementation of India’s digital MSME scheme. Cloud datacenter parks are proposed and Cloud Vision 2020 aims to establish India as a global hub for cloud computing, content hosting and delivery data communication systems and services. At an event on ‘safeguarding the planet’ on the sidelines of G20, PM Modi had said that the world can progress faster if there is greater support of technology and finance to the developing world. The recently announced 10-sector PLI scheme, including manufacturing of ACC battery, represents one of the largest economic opportunities of the twenty-first century for several global growth sectors - such as consumer electronics, EVs and RE. The automobile industry is under major disruption, and ICE is already at the beginning of its decline. The upstart e-mobility will now need all the support to make a swift entry and contribute towards a cut-back in temperature rise. Alongside, research is on to make EVs even greener through use of zero emission hydrogen. As a country India is working on reforms and transformation, the only bottleneck is speed. We must understand and recognise opportunities as well as the opportune time, since time waits for no one. Post pandemic, industry has to function in conjunction with nature and make the Earth green again. In the prime minister’s words - "We [India] are showing the world that sound environmental policies can make sound economic policies."