The US has a historic opportunity to learn lessons from its Cold War experience in its handling of India.
The latest signal is the news today that US-listed conglomerate Alphabet’s search internet technology subsidiary Google has allocated $10bn to India’s startups, among other organisations in the country.
Sundar Pinchai, CEO of Alphabet, said: “Over the years, we’ve invested in many Indian businesses through Google, as well as through our growth equity investment fund CapitalG.
“Today, I am excited to announce the Google for India Digitization Fund. Through this effort, we will invest ₹75,000 crore, or approximately $10bn, into India over the next five to seven years. We will do this through a mix of equity investments, partnerships and operational, infrastructure and ecosystem investments.”
Pinchai said the move came about because “four years ago, only one-third of all small businesses in India had an online presence. Today, 26 million [small and medium-sized businesses] are now discoverable.”
But it also reflects geopolitical calculations, as India turns from China to the US for capital and support; as discussed in this week’s podcast nationalism is increasingly the sixth factor with which entrepreneurs are looking for help.
Facebook, which rivals Google in India, made a $5.7bn investment in telecoms platform Reliance Jio Platforms in April.
In total, Reliance Jio Platforms has raised about $15.8bn since it was spun off by Reliance Industries, from more than a dozen investors, including Intel Capital last week and Qualcomm on Sunday.
Amazon has meanwhile committed $6.5bn to India, including $1bn earlier this year.
The turning off of state support to Chinese apps and funding in favour of the US reflects a remarkable pivot.
India was officially non-aligned in the Cold War between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the US. The USSR, however, was India’s primary supplier of modern weapons and industry, and funded Indian newspapers.
As a new Cold War looms between this era’s dominant powers, the US and China are ramping up their positioning among the rest of the world for primacy in the tech economy. India’s 1.3 billion people and its economic power could be significant.
But where India leans one way, Pakistan will lean the other. Pakistan has long funded Afghanistan’s Taliban as a strategic hedge for America’s withdrawal, and with this underway after February’s deal between the US and Afghanistan it creates a north-west region of turbulence for India that is already being exploited by China.
And while India has its eyes on the US, it is reminded the Mughal empire was created from expansion down from Kabul.
