Agencies
New Delhi
Tech titans will court Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Silicon Valley this weekend, but away from the glitz, the euphoria of his first trip to the United States a year ago has faded as promised deals stall and key reforms flounder.
A firm believer in the new economy and power of social media, Modi will be welcomed by Apple, Facebook and Google, who want to grow in a market where the world's third-largest internet user base is set to multiply in coming years.
Apple CEO Tim Cook is due to drop by Modi's hotel in San Jose, before the Indian leader joins Mark Zuckerberg for a "townhall" session broadcast live from Facebook headquarters. But in other areas, progress has been slow.
Western businesses and diplomats in Delhi privately say Modi's reputation as a man of action has been hurt by setbacks on economic reform. Some carp that he is better at speeches and launching projects than seeing them through.
"The sheen is off, certainly. He is no longer the new kid on the block," said Neelam Deo, a former Indian diplomat in Washington now at Gateway House, a think-tank.
"The first trip was euphoric, this one is much more a consolidation phase of the relationship."
On the Sept. 24-29 trip, Modi's mind will be focused more on solar power than nuclear; he has an ambitious target to build 100 GW of solar capacity in seven years.
On Saturday he visits Tesla Motor's Elon Musk to learn about battery technology that could help harness the power of the sun. He will also attend a renewable energy talk at Stanford.
On the first trip by an Indian prime minister to Silicon Valley, Modi hopes to attract funds and skills from U.S. innovators to help India's burgeoning start-up scene grow, and he will seek to encourage some Indians who have thrived around San Jose to bring their knowledge back home.
"He'll be building a bridge," said Rajat Tandon, who heads a programme focused on startups at Indian IT group NASSCOM and was among the dozens of Indian entrepreneurs flying to California to join Modi this week.
For GE, which helped start India's IT revolution 30 years ago with an early commitment to outsourcing, the future in India is less about startups and more about Modi's flagship "Make In India" programme, Immelt said, but only time will tell if it works.
