EUROPE| JANUARY 2020| ISSUE 2 | 3,880 projects worth ?1.4 lakh cr tendered out under Centre’s Smart Cities initiative

Message From SESEI

Greeting from Project SESEI !!!

Dear Readers,

On behalf of Project SESEI and its stakeholders, I take this opportunity to wish you all a very Happy New Year 2020.

As per the Morgan & Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Year 2020 will bring positive trends in the global economic growth and a greater focus on trade & investments and creation of infrastructure in the developing economies will be seen. Infrastructure sector is a key driver for the Indian economy. The sector is highly responsible for propelling India’s overall development and enjoys intense focus from Government for initiating policies that would ensure time-bound creation of world class infrastructure in the country. India has a requirement of investment worth Rs 50 trillion (US$ 777.73 billion) in infrastructure by 2022 to have sustainable development in the country. The Government of India is expected to invest highly in the infrastructure sector, mainly highways, renewable energy and urban transport. This is also reflecting in the strong dialogue being built between India and Europe in all verticals and sectors. Strong partnership on Climate change, Energy efficiency, new and green technologies are being forged between India and the European countries. MoU’s between India and Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and Eastern European countries were signed during the last quarter.

In the second edition of our “SESEI Newsletter Europe”, we have brought together information and updates on the various government initiatives, policies, market updates, policy & regulatory decisions and standards development activities being carried out in India around our project priority sectors.

This exchange of updates and information form a core part of the Project SESEI objectives, ensuring that the stakeholders and partners are always fully abreast and aware of the important developments and standardization related information concerning priority sector in India.

The other significant objective of Project SESEI is to propel harmony and synergies between the Indian and European standardization bodies to work together in areas of common interest. CEN CENELEC along with Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) organized a two-day workshop in India on 26th & 27th November 2019, towards creating close working relationship and to understand the commonalities and gaps on standardization strategy and standards development process between India, Europe & Globally. The interactions between the stakeholders from both sides including representation from IEC/ISO were highly engaging and result oriented creating an active roadmap for CEN-CENELEC and BIS to follow-up.

The government of India is also working towards stricter mechanism to increase the exports and curbing imports of non-essential items through stricter technical regulations and standards. BIS has been directed to set quality standards to ensure Indian items are not rejected in global market. The authority of international quality standards for products and services has been recognized to increase the trade & services. BIS will work to ensure that all standards are in line with global standards.

ICT as always is extremely active and dynamic sector in India. Significant progress has been made on the important subjects of IoT/M2M and the draft report for adoption oneM2M Release 2 documents) transposed by TSDSI having basic features may be adopted by TEC as a National Standard for IoT/M2M ecosystem in India very shortly. A report on IoT Framework in India was formulated by Ministry of Electronics and IT (MEITY), to which SESEI was one of the contributors highlighting work of EU in it covering 3GPP, ETSI, oneM2M etc.

Similarly, standardization of Artificial Intelligence technology is also underway. DoT has formed a committee for the standardization of Artificial Intelligence (AI) which will address different aspects of AI such as – functional network architecture, AI architecture, data structures required, etc.

In the automotive sector, creation of ecosystem for electrical vehicles is of key importance. All possible efforts by the Ministry of Power, Ministry of Road & Transport as well as Heavy Industries is being initiated to have an effective infrastructure in place for the onset of electrical vehicles in the country by 2030. The EV charging guidelines have been revised and testing facilities for E-vehicles and business proposals for rollout of charging stations are being finalized.

To boost the local manufacturing and encourage the start-up entrepreneurship, Ministry of Finance has announced a significant cut in corporate tax – this move is likely to ensure rise in investments in manufacturing. The government is also considering to constitute a working group on the proposed new industrial policy, which is aimed at promoting emerging sectors, reducing regulatory hurdles and making India a manufacturing hub.

Many more such news and updates have been captured in this 2nd edition of our newsletter, which shall hopefully make the newsletter an interesting and informative read for all of you.

I would like to conclude with wishing you all a great and very productive year ahead. Happy Reading.

Warm regards,
Dinesh Chand Sharma
(Seconded European Standardization Expert in India)