India Ranks Third Among Most Promising Nations for Disruptive Technology

India ranks third among countries that show the most promise for disruptive technology breakthroughs that will impact the world, according to KPMG’s 2018 Global Technology Innovation Report that was released on March 28. The United States is the tech leader while China holds the second place on the list.

More than one-third (34 percent) of those surveyed named the United States as the most promising market for tech breakthroughs compared to 26 percent in last year’s report. China remained second at 26 percent, and India ranked third at 13 percent, with the United Kingdom and Japan coming fourth. The report highlights key findings from a survey of nearly 800 technology industry leaders globally about technology innovation, leadership and market trends.

India has prioritized government support for entrepreneurship and a burgeoning culture of innovation. Many start-up business models are leveraging emerging technologies to cater to India’s mobile-first generation, the report said.

Bengaluru was the only Indian city that industry leaders said would be leading technology innovation in the next four years. They were asked about which cities in addition to Silicon Valley, San Francisco, would be technology hubs.

Among those surveyed, 16 per cent people thought that the tech innovation center of the world will shift from Silicon Valley to India. The responses were affected by nationalism as well. For example, in a global survey, 58 per cent Indians voted to say that Bengaluru will become a global technology hub in the next four years while only 10 per cent of voters from across the world voted for the Indian city. Mumbai received 2 per cent votes while New Delhi and Hyderabad received 1 per cent each.

“Innovation has become decentralized globally with some cities making great progress while others still face macroeconomic and infrastructure challenges,” said Tim Zanni, global and US technology sector leader for KPMG. “Many factors affect a city’s perception as an innovation hub, including favorable government policies and incentives, accelerators, tech parks, corporate investment, state-of-the-art infrastructure and, in all cases, at least a few highly successful and wildly popular success stories.”

Among the innovation visionaries, Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, was ranked first, followed by the Indian American Google CEO Sundar Pichai. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg came in third, and Alibaba chairman Jack Ma was ranked fourth. Indian American Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Bill Gates tied for the fifth place while Alphabet CEO Larry Page and Apple CEO Tim Cook took the seventh spot.

Google was again cited as the leading visionary company in driving tech innovation. Apple, Microsoft, and Tesla came in second, third and fourth, respectively. Amazon and Alibaba tied for the fifth spot.

Bengaluru, the most preferred tech hub in India, is home to Flipkart, Ola, Big Basket, Swiggy, Jabong, Quikr, among other startups.