Mr. Arijit Sarker talks on "Internet 2.0: The India story"

Arijit Sarker, Director India operations at Google, addressed the trainees of TalentSprint on 26^th March 2013. Talking to the trainees about "Internet 2.0”, he started the conversation by recalling those days way back in 1995 when Indians were first introduced to the word Internet. Those were the days when people used to access their email accounts once in a month and could barely see 10 mails in their inbox. Internet then was all about boring static html pages. In the year 2015 the internet users then, will talk about the inadequate use of the internet by the users of today.

Starting 2012 till 2015, internet will witness a sea of change and transform itself to the next version of internet 2.0. The next generation internet will be more interactive via increasing social applications & self publishing platforms. Internet will be more interactive, intelligent and fun for the users in coming years.

He said there 3 key drivers which will set the pace for changing dynamics of internet usage in India

1. Access: Currently there are 137 million internet users in India which will grow to 350 million internet user base by 2015. Access to internet on mobile is gaining traction (165 million users by 2015); rapid development in 3G and 4G connections will contribute to the growth story. The government initiatives to connect villages, universities and other important data houses using national optical fibre are also gaining momentum.




2. Consumption Patterns: Voice based search is going to be the next big trend, this will make search faster easier and accurate. With advanced search options like location based search, device based search and with the help of social applications internet users are more empowered.




3. Social and economic conditions: The changing consumer dynamics will impact the way internet is used. The modern consumer is more intelligent he will go through ample research before making any purchase. Consumers will read blogs, participate in discussion forums to understand the features of the product they want to purchase. Buying products and services is online is picking up at high pace, the current ecommerce contribution towards India’s GDP is 1.6% which is a 14 billion market today and is expected to reach 30 to 40 billion by 2015.

He also discussed on how internet 2.0 can help more than 30 million small and medium scale businesses find their space online and improve on market reach. Also mentioned the job opportunities that can be created but not on a large scale.

It was an interactive session where he answered the audience questions & discussing on Google’s plans and strategies in line with emerging trends in the internet industry.