NEW DELHI: Indian companies Wipro and Tech Mahindra are collaborating with Finnish companies for development and expansion of 5G and 6G technologies for use in India and other markets, a senior Indian official said on Tuesday.
Finnish company Nokia is already working in rural areas of India to expand 5 G applications, Neeta Bhushan, joint secretary in charge of Central Europe told reporters after a virtual summit between the prime ministers of India and Finland on Tuesday.
“Finland has been a pioneer in 2G,3G and 4G technologies,” Bhushan said. “Wipro and Tech Mahindra are working with Finnish companies and institutes for further collaboration and expansion of 5G and in the evolution of 6G technologies as well,” she said.
According to experts, 5G mobile networks will not just enable faster speeds for downloading data, it will support transportation, power and many other kinds of infrastructure including remote controlling of machinery in factories. 5G is seen as the foundation for realizing the full potential of Internet of Things.
According to Bhushan, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Finnish counterpart Sanna Marin reviewed ongoing collaboration in the areas of innovation, research and development, energy including clean technologies, trade and Investment.
The two prime ministers agreed that the “ongoing collaboration in joint development of Quantum Computer with the use of Artificial Intelligence (between Indian Institute of Science, Education and Research, Pune and Aalto University in Finland) to meet the societal challenges was an excellent example of the close association in niche areas,” she said.
According to a joint statement issued after the talks, India and Finland “noted that the digital domain was one of the most promising sectors for an intensive India−Finland partnership.”
Under this, the focus areas for the two countries included “future ICT, focusing on quantum technologies and computing, future mobile technologies, focusing on 6G research and development, future education, focusing on digital transformation of teaching and learning, essential and cross-cutting elements of all these key domains are the utilisation of artificial intelligence, cyber security and blockchain technologies.”
“In this partnership, the companies and universities of both countries can leverage their strengths for mutual benefit,” the joint statement said.
The two prime ministers also announced a high level dialogue in education. They welcomed “the proposal to renew the MoU between consortium of 10 Finnish Universities and 23 IITs for the next five years,” Bhushan said.
The two prime ministers looked forward to meeting each other at the India-European Union Leaders’ meeting in Portugal in May as well as India-Nordic Summit to be held later this year, she added.
