India, US adopt host of joint initiatives on semiconductors, AI, defence startups

With an aim to expand and deepen partnerships in technology and defence sectors, India and the US have agreed upon multiple bilateral initiatives.

The measures include reviewing a possibility of producing Made-In-India jet engines of General Electric; launching a new innovation bridge to connect the US and Indian defence startups; enhancing collaboration on semiconductor supply chains and developing common standards for trustworthy artificial intelligence that are aligned with democratic values.

These were decided in a January 30 meeting of the US-India initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET), attended by National Security Advisors of India Ajit Doval and his US counterpart Jake Sullivan. Others who were present at the meeting were Indian Space Research Organisation chairman S Somanath, secretary of Department of Telecommunciations and others.

Minister of State in Electronics and IT ministry Rajeev Chandrasekhar lauded this partnership between the two countries and said that it will be good for the future.

In the technology area, firstly, a White House release said that both countries will "develop common standards and benchmarks for trustworthy AI". They will do this by coordinating on the development of consensus  and ensuring that the standards are aligned with democratic values.

"The United States and India affirm that the ways in which technology is designed, developed, governed, and used should be shaped by our shared democratic values and respect for universal human rights," the White House statement said.

"We are committed to fostering an open, accessible, and secure technology ecosystem, based on mutual trust and confidence, that will reinforce our democratic values and democratic institutions," it added.

The two will also work on promoting collaboration on high performance computing, by working with the US Congress to lower export barriers of HPC technology and source code.

In the defence area, the White House statement said that the US has received an application from General Electric to produce jet engines that could power jet aircraft operated and produced indigenously by India.

"The United States commits to an expeditious review of  this application," the briefing read.

On semiconductors, the US government will welcome a taskforce jointly organised by the Indian Electronics Semiconductor Association and Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) to develop "a readiness assessment to identify near-term industry opportunities..."

"This task force will make recommendations to the Department of Commerce and the India Semiconductor Mission on opportunities and challenges to overcome in order to further strengthen India’s role within the global semiconductor value chain, and will also provide input to the U.S.-India Commercial Dialogue," the White House statement said.

The two countries will also work on human spaceflight , that will include advanced training for ISRO astronauts at NASA Johnson Space Center.

Apart from that, India and US will work on identifying approaches for the commercial sectors of the two countries to collaborate, especially with respect to activities related to NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) project.

"Within the next year, NASA, with ISRO, will convene U.S. CLPS companies and Indian aerospace companies to advance this initiative," the statement said.

The duo also decided that the agenda of the US-India Civil Space Joint Working Group will be expanded to include planetary defence.

Later this year, the United States and India will hold the next iCET meeting in New Delhi this year.

"The National Security Councils of both countries will coordinate with their respective ministries, departments and agencies to work with their counterparts to advance cooperation, and to engage with stakeholders to deliver on ambitious objectives ahead of the next meeting," the statement said.