India's entrepreneurial innovators have the potential to build the "next Google" if the country "plays its cards right" and ensures Internet access for millions of its citizens, Google's executive chairman Eric Schmidt has said.
In an essay written for the book Reimagining India: Unlocking The Potential of Asia's Next Superpower edited by global consulting firm McKinsey, Schmidt dubbed India "an Internet laggard" saying he feels Internet in the country today is like where it was in America in about 1994 - four years before Google was even born.
He said India must increase its Internet reach across towns and cities, a move that will have a positive impact on its economy and society.
The former Google CEO said he witnessed the creative potential of India's people all around him in Silicon Valley where India-born entrepreneurs account for 40 per cent of start-ups.
"Just think what will happen when India's entrepreneurial innovators are able to create great global companies without leaving their country. They will change the world. Hundreds of large firms focused on the Internet will be founded and will succeed by focusing purely on Indian consumers, Indian taste, Indian style, Indian sports.
"Can anyone of those companies ultimately become the next Google? Of course."
"That may not happen for quite a few years. But if India plays its cards right, we will soon see Indian engineers and small businesses tackling Indian problems first, then exporting the solutions that work best," Schmidt said.
With a total population of 1.2 billion, India has over 600 million mobile-phone users but only about 150 million people regularly connect to the Internet. In 2011, India's Internet reach rate was 11 per cent, "far below" that of developed nations where penetration rates average 70 per cent.
India's Internet reach rate is less than a third of China's penetration ratio of 38 per cent and less than half of those in developing countries, which average 24 per cent.
"By any reasonable definition, India is an Internet laggard.... In spite of its well deserved reputation as one of the world's leading IT and software development hubs, India is far from being the connected society many foreigners imagine," Schmidt said. The number of India's broadband users, 20 million, is even smaller, Schmidt said however adding that India is on the cusp of a connectivity revolution.
"I believe India has the chance to leapfrog its current connectivity challenges, bring Internet access to a majority of its citizens - and even raise its penetration ratio to 60 or 70 per cent within the next 5-10 years," he said.
The former Google CEO said it is "no secret" that India is plagued by corruption, which impedes the country's economic progress, frustrates ordinary people's efforts to advance themselves and seriously infringes on individuals' rights to fair treatment by the authorities.
He argued that Internet freedom will produce information and images that are displeasing and even appalling to many segments of society.
"False accusations and hateful commentary are inevitable if unfortunate components of the Internet mix," he said adding that democratising Internet access has a potentially game-changing impact on governance. Schmidt said one of the Internet's "great virtues" is that it empowers individuals and groups to expose the excesses and abuses of those in positions of power. "As the Internet penetrates India...We will see dramatic improvement in the status of women, access to education and the transparency in public life necessary to improve governance and attack corruption. All of those are necessary preconditions to the economic and commercial success that India's remarkably talented people deserve." India's "ambivalence" about Internet freedom often surprises those who do not live, travel or do business in the country since other countries like China are far more famous for exerting command and control over cyberspace, he said.
