Bill Gates praises UPI, Aadhaar; Says India will be the cheapest 5G market

India’s vast digital public infrastructure got a rousing endorsement from billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates on Wednesday as he praised the country’s “great” digital network, reliable and low-cost connectivity and said it would be the cheapest 5G market.

Under India’s G20 Presidency, a session on ‘Building Resilient and Inclusive Economies – The Promise of Digital Public Infrastructure’ was held in New Delhi on Wednesday, where Microsoft Co-founder talks about India’s digital identity BaseIts payment infrastructure, and the rapid progress that the country has made in bringing more people into the formal banking system.

“India in particular, by laying the groundwork for digital public infrastructure starting with identity systems, allows people to build on that. And to make financial access and financial payments an element of it in a trusted way allows for an incredible variety of applications. Speaking at the event, Gates said, “We are just at the beginning of this. We’re seeing incredible ease of use of it, and it’s in so many different areas.”

Gates – who is co-chairman and trustee of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation – said that COVID-19 has demonstrated the value of digital payment systems to facilitate emergency relief payments around the world.

Gates said, “No country has built a more comprehensive platform than India. India was a leader in receiving (relief) payments during the pandemic, due to pioneering investments, including creating basic Aadhaar identification.”

He said India could be “such an example” for other countries.

“As I said the Indian system is more ambitious in its own breath, the digital vision from the very beginning included areas such as helping the government with its tasks, or enabling the exchange of educational content,” he said.

Gates said this is an exciting year to showcase India’s innovations in digital public infrastructure and other areas.

“It is wonderful that as part of this G20 Presidency, with the aim of telling people about its benefits and offering to help them on their journey to adapt it to their needs, that India is taking a lead in this. stands as it is,” Gates said.

He added: “We would like to see all countries, especially developing countries, adopting these things.” Gates, who addressed the session, also talked about India’s competitive private market, reliable and low-cost connectivity, innovation landscape and said it would be the cheapest 5G market.

“One thing that India has that is great is that you have a great digital network, you have a very high percentage of people using smartphones, You have started transaction with feature phone also.”

Gates said that connectivity has been an enabling factor for India.

The tech icon said, “The connectivity is great, it’s very reliable, it’s the cheapest in the world. And the same is going to happen in 5G. There is no doubt that it will be the cheapest 5G in the market.”

Gates realized that the India model could be replicated in other countries as well, provided they enhanced their public infrastructure. India and Singapore linked digital payment systems last week and it is “a very worthwhile goal”.

“If we can reduce the overhead on remittance payments by even a few percent, that’s a huge amount,” he said.

India and Singapore earlier this month linked the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) network with Singapore’s PayNow. is iThe PayNow linkage will enable users of the two fast payment systems in any country to make convenient, secure, quick and cost-effective cross-border money transfers using their respective mobile apps.

Gates said the beauty of digital systems is that it allows for researchers to unlock information about who is using the system, but at an aggregate level and does not compromise privacy.

“The ability to continuously improve to understand… whether it’s easy to use, whether it works well across different verticals… there’s a lot to be done on that, including things like innovation centers that allow for that quick experiment,” he said.

Gates said that India would have to streamline the justice system and that “if there is a delay… it is a barrier to business investment”.

Gates referred to the mobile infrastructure space, saying that there was “wild competition with winners and losers” and that while it was a tough one, the government did not single out any particular company.

“In the end, the users were the beneficiaries,” he observed.

Telecom and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnav termed 2023 as a historic year, and said that digital technology has come of age.

Artificial intelligence, 5G and quantum computing have matured to become mainstream technologies.

The minister said that India has created a unique framework for digital economy, which is focused on making a difference in the lives of people.

Vaishnav said, “The uniqueness of India’s digital public infrastructure is that unlike many geographies where digital technology was concentrated with large tech companies, India has a public private partnership model where every stakeholder has an important role to play.”

He outlined India’s major initiatives such as Aadhaar, UPI, COIN and now the indigenous 4G/5G stack. He said that India has made it a policy objective that the benefits of digital technology should reach all sections of the society. The minister emphasized that India is happy to share its technology for the benefit of the world.