Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder and business tycoon, is on a three-day visit to India. He arrived in India on January 15, 2020, and first paid homage to the father of the nation, Mahatma Gandhi. During his current visit, he also had a discussion on January 15, 2020, with Amit Agarwal, Senior VP and Country Head – Amazon India. They had a fireside chat at the ‘Amazon SMBhav’, a mega summit for small and medium businesses (SMBs).
The whole audience at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium listened to the tycoon with rapt attention and frequently clapped during the Amazon SMBhav. They roared when Bezos bet big on India saying that the “21st-century belongs to India.”
He said: “I wanna make a prediction for you, I predict that the 21st-century is going to be the Indian century. The dynamism, energy … everywhere I go here, people are interested in self-improvement, growth. This country has something special. This is going to be the Indian century.”
People might think that it was just the speech that gave off a desi vibe; however, that’s not the case. The 56-year-old donned a vibrant blue-coloured Nehru jacket and pants. He later confirmed that it was given to him by one of the SMB founders. He was also seen lighting a lamp before the summit began, keeping up with the Indian tradition.
In the Amazon SMBhav, he emphasised, “The only way it can become India’s century is if the country becomes economically powerful, and the only way India can become economically powerful is if per capita revenue productivity goes up from current $2,000 or ₹1,40,000 to somewhere three to four times, or ideally five times.”
He also sees India as an important market for Amazon outside the United States and believed that bilateral relation between the world’s oldest democracy and the world’s largest democracy would result favourably. Furthermore, he showed concern about climate change and stated that Amazon aims to eliminate plastic usage in India by June 2020.
Another major announcement made by Jeff Bezos was about the SMBs stating that he aims to digitise Indian SMBs and would be spending $1 billion for the same.
Praising Jeff Bezos for his prediction, Infosys co-founder, Narayana Murthy said that the duty to make this prediction come real rests on our shoulders entirely.
.@JeffBezos & @iamsrk – don ko pakadna mushkil hi nahin impossible hai!!! pic.twitter.com/mFlrSfXA56
— Riteish Deshmukh (@Riteishd) January 16, 2020
Jeff Bezos had also a celebrity meeting and a chat with none other than Shah Rukh Khan, the Bollywood superstar on January 17, 2020. A video shared by Riteish Deshmukh, wherein King Khan made Bezos say his famous dialogue from the movie ‘Don’–“Don ko pakadna mushkil hi nahin namumkin hai” with a Bezos touch, went viral in twitter. Furthermore, he is also scheduled to meet with Mukesh Ambani and Ratan Tata.
Bezos had predicted before as well, which had come true. Twenty years ago, in 1999, Bezos made the following few predictions which ultimately became a reality. Have a look for yourself.
- “We want to try and build a place where people can come to find and discover anything that they might want to buy online,” Bezos said in an appearance on Charlie Rose’s talk show.
- “Strip malls are history.”
- Bezos predicted that physical storefronts would last only if they could provide at least one of two core features: entertainment value or immediate convenience.
- “I’m a big believer in this notion of sort of appliances, that there’ll be lots of little things that are connected to the Internet, there’ll be a whole bunch of things sort of connected to the network.”
So you never know what can happen when it’s Bezos prediction. What do you think about Jeff Bezos prediction? Do you think it’ll come true?
