Hyderabad: Telangana chief minister A Revanth Reddy and his team have planned meetings with over seventy industry leaders during their presence at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland between January 15-19.
In a pre-visit press conference held by IT and Industries minister D Sridhar Babu, he said that since the formation of Telangana, this is the first time that a chief minister is going to lead an official delegation to WEF.
“Principal Secretary (IT and Industries) and Principal Secretary to the chief minister are also part of our delegation,” he informed.
Sridhar Babu termed WEF as “an excellent opportunity to meet and interact with top industry leaders both from India and abroad and share the new government’s vision and priorities.”
“It is also an ideal platform to showcase the strength of our state as a leading IT and Life Sciences hub and attract investments,” he added.
Packed schedule
The Industries minister said that his team has worked out a “very packed schedule” at Davos.
“The chief minister and I will be meeting as many as 70 industry leaders in 3 days. This includes CEOs and CXOs of top global companies like Novartis, Medtronic, AstraZeneca, Google, Uber, Mastercard, Bayer, LDC and UPL. We will also be meeting captains of the Indian industry including Tata, Wipro, HCL Tech, JSW, Godrej, Airtel, and Bajaj. Interaction with leading business chambers like CII and NASSCOM as well as media networks are also planned,” he stated.
Sridhar Babu further said that their team is “leaving no stone unturned to make it a very successful and productive trip.”
“We expect to sign several MOUs and close significant investment deals in different sectors like pharma, electronics, data centres, defense and aerospace, food processing and renewable energy. We will be sharing more details about these every day from Davos,” he added.
Revanth to address WEF Congress Centre
He also informed that the chief minister has also been invited to speak at the WEF Congress Centre, a “special honour to get during his very first visit to Davos.”
“He will be sharing his views during the panel discussion on transforming healthcare, digitally, which is also a key priority for our government. He will also be attending another high-level WEF event on ‘Food Systems and Local Action’ where he will speak about the impact of climate change on the agri-economy and measures to promote climate-resilient agriculture while protecting farmers’ livelihoods,” Sridhar said.
The minister also informed that he will be participating in a panel discussion on ‘Developing Skills for AI’ being hosted by the AI industry.
“I will also be separately meeting several tech companies, trade organizations and NRI entrepreneurs,” he added.
Meeting with WEF top management
“Lastly, we will also be meeting with the top management of the World Economic Forum including its President, Mr Brende Borge, and several sector heads. Telangana has a strong institutional engagement with WEF. As you may be aware, Hyderabad is the only city in India to host WEF’s Centre for 4th Industrial Revolution (C4IR) for the Healthcare and Life Sciences sector. In addition, WEF is actively supporting a lot of tech initiatives in the agriculture and food processing sectors,” Sridhar said.
World Economic Forum is the premier international platform where government leaders, global CEOs, industry captains, social entrepreneurs, and newsmakers meet every year in a collaborative spirit to address global issues and shape the agenda for government, industry, and societal action.
WEF is an invite-only event and attracts participation from over 3000 delegates every year includes representatives from 100 governments, the top 1000 global companies, all leading international organizations, NGOs and media.
