Cisco to invest $100 million on start-ups in India and train over 2.5 lakh students by 2020

US networking giant Cisco has joined a long list of global technology biggies to invest in India to further nurture the booming startup ecosystem by confirming to invest $100 million over the next two years. The series of investment will include $40 million that will be utilized to financially assist early-stage startups and thereby train around 2.5 lakh students by the year 2020.

• The remaining funds will be utilized in establishing 6 new innovation labs and 3 centres of expertise and simultaneously it will be used to collaborate with universities and investing in skill development. The company will also work closely with state governments on strategic initiatives and it also said that India is right on the path towards digitization and its economy is growing at such rapid speed because of its digital economy.
• Dinesh Malkani, President of Cisco India and SAARC said that the networking giant has expertise in security, cloud and the Internet of Things and can thus collaborate with the IP driven software companies in the country. The company so far has over 10,000 people working for them in India and is also setting up a manufacturing unit in Pune to make products locally to support the ‘Digital India’ and ‘Make-in-India’ initiatives.
• Executive Chairman of Cisco, Mr. John Chambers has reportedly backed the country’s long quest to approach the World Trade Organization (WTO) on visa issues. Apart from Cisco, last month Oracle has also announced $400 million expansion of their facility in India to set up a long list of incubation centres to groom startups and provide hardcore training to nurture young talents as well.

(Source: ET)