Inspiring Journeys, which featured the incredible stories of four women entrepreneurs from remote villages in the Indian Union Territory of Ladakh, and Olympic boxing medallist Mary Kom marked the wrap of India Global Forum’s (IGF) fifth annual UK-India Week, with the second edition of the exclusive ‘Founders and Funders Retreat’ in Windsor over the weekend.
Nima Goos Goos Co-founders Padma Angmo and Rigzin Angmo, and Co-founders of Ladakh Brew Deachen Chusket and Jigmet Angmo spoke of wanting to put Ladakhi traditions on the global map with their start-ups centred around locally sourced Himalayan products.
Angmo said: “Ladakh has an abundance of high-nutrient crops and herbs but sadly not in the market. We started our business to share the goodness of Ladakh.”
Cobra Beer Founder Lord Karan Bilimoria joined IGF Founder and Chairman Manoj Ladwa for a Reflections and Horizon Gazing session as the curtain came down on another power-packed UK-India Week.
Artificial intelligence (AI) was among the key focus of discussions at the Retreat, as participants delved into the collaborative potential of AI, its impact across sectors and the convergence of sports, media, and social networks in the tech era.
Agam Khare, Founder, Absolute, said: “Everything we are talking about AI or computing power will never be able to beat the complexity that nature presents to us. For example, if you expand your DNA, you could go to the moon and come back fifteen hundred times… The real intelligence is Natural Intelligence, Nature’s Intelligence.
“AI is good, but AI is just a tool to Nature’s Intelligence. Nature’s Intelligence is four and half billion years old. AI is less than a hundred years old. To think that something that is less than a hundred years old can beat something that is four billion years is a bit of an extension. Nature’s intelligence is the future.”
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Builder.ai Co-founder Sachin Duggal added: “There is a massive information paradox with AI. There are about 500 experts on AI, yet hundred thousand people claiming to be experts and trying to define policy. You have a massive information paradox where you are making decisions in a vacuum without really understanding the security implications. Regulation is about bringing the right people to the room.”
The Retreat also witnessed the first-ever ‘IGF Pitchers and Punters’, where British start-ups pitched to Indian investors. Sanjay Nayar, General Partner, Sorin Investments, said the key was to pitch “real world solutions to some real world problems”
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The Retreat marked the culmination of six days of curated panel discussions, keynote addresses and UK-India Awards with over 150 speakers and 2,000+ participants spread across 12 marque events in London and Windsor.
*Info: UK-India Week 2023