On August 31st in Mumbai, AMCHAM hosted an interaction with Senator Jon Ossoff (D-GA) and U.S. industry leadership during his 8day visit to India to boost bilateral relations between the two countries. Ms. Valerie Swope, Program Coordinator, AMCHAM welcomed the Senator and Consul General Mike Hankey who was recently posted in Mumbai. Mr. William L. Blair, National Executive Board Member and Chairman – Defense Committee, AMCHAM and Chief Executive, Lockheed Martin India, provided an overview of the U.S.-India partnership and set the tone for the discussions. Consul General Mike Hankey, U.S. Consulate General Mumbai, shared about the importance of the bilateral relationship, strategically and commercially. Senator Ossoff shared about his hopes for this trip, his Indian American constituents and support of the bilateral relations.

U.S. industry representations Mr. Nikhil Sahni, Division President, South Asia & Country Corporate Officer, India, Mastercard, Mr. Deepak Shrivastava, Managing Director – Indian Subcontinent, UPS, Mr. Rakesh H. Tripathi, MD and Country Head, India, WestRock Company and Mr. Abdul (Hamid) Salim, Vice President – Maritime and Mission Systems (MMS) Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin Company, shared their perspectives on a variety of topics such as supply chain resilience, cultural people to people ties, India’s energy future, digital economy, IPEF, data storage and the MSME sector, among others. Mr. Deepak Shrivastava provided a vote of thanks to the Senator’s delegation and Consulate for their efforts in strengthening the U.S.-India relationship.

The first meeting of the AMCHAM’s Medical Devices Committee was held virtually on August 29th under the Chairmanship of Mr. Manoj Madhavan, Chairman – Medical Devices Committee, AMCHAM and Managing Director, Boston Scientific and Ms. Meenakshi Nevatia, Co-Chairperson – Medical Device Committee, AMCHAM and Managing Director, Stryker. Senior policy and regulatory technical leads as well as healthcare experts from almost 30 members participated the committee meeting. The committee discussed that going forward, all the committee’s activities and initiatives would focus on access to innovation and ease of doing business. Some of the priority issues highlighted and discussed included PPO, TMR, UCPMDMP, FTM, NMDPC meeting, etc. The committee would be actively engaged with state government engagements, in addition to the policy advocacy. It was also decided to lead a delegation to Bangladesh.

On August 29th, AMCHAM and Observer Research Foundation (ORF) co-hosted a closed door roundtable on the U.S.-India defense partnership in New Delhi. The session brought together key stakeholders from the Indian government, members of Indian and U.S. defense industry and strategic experts. The discussions focused on boosting defense exports from India with a focus on co-development and co-production. The discussions were moderated by Prof. Harsh Pant, Vice President – Studies and Foreign Policy, ORF and was addressed by Mr. Sanjay Jaju, Additional Secretary Defence Production, Ministry of Defence, Government of India. Lt. Gen. Shantanu Dayal, Deputy Chief of Army Staff, Capability Development and Sustenance, Indian Army, Government of India, Air Marshal Suraj Kumar Jha, Air Officer-in-Charge Personnel, Air Headquarters, Indian Air Force, Government of India and Mr. William Blair, National Executive Board Member and Chairman – Defense Committee, AMCHAM and Chief Executive India, Lockheed Martin India, were other panellists in the session which also included interactions from other senior leaders and stakeholders.

View the key takeaways from this session HERE

The first meeting of the AMCHAM’s Pharmaceutical Committee was held virtually on August 26th under the leadership of Mr. Umang Chaturvedi, Chairman – Pharmaceutical Committee, AMCHAM and Head of Policy & International Affairs, Mylan and Ms. Jyotsna Ghosal, Co-Chairperson – Pharmaceutical Committee, AMCHAM and Executive Director – Corporate Communications, Johnson and Johnson. Senior healthcare experts from Baxter, Eli Lilly, Honeywell India, Corning Technologies, IFF, Deloitte, Par Formulations, Dua Associates, APCO Worldwide and Paraxel participated. It was decided that going forward, the committee would focus on select policy and regulatory issues. Some of the priority issues highlighted by members included market access issues – PPO and TMR, regulatory barriers and IP burden. In addition, the committee would be strongly taking up policy advocacy with relevant stakeholders and have engagements with state governments.

AMCHAM’s Infrastructure and Smart Cities Committee met virtually on August 24th to discuss opportunities and issues in the sector. After a quick round of introductions, Mr. Rajesh Dhar, Chairman – Infrastructure and Smart Cities Committee, AMCHAM and Senior Director, Infrastructure & Hardware Growth, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) set the context for member interaction. This was followed by a presentation by Mr. Pradeep Balijepalli, Chief Commercial Officer, Honeywell Building Technologies regarding a white paper on ‘Making Cities Smarter and Sustainable – Policy and Technology recommendations,’ which generated a good discussion with policy recommendations taking priority. Thereafter, came the presentation by Dr. Philo Daniel, Global Director, Urban Security, Smiths Detection on safety and security for interconnected cities. Dr. Daniel joined the meeting from London and spoke about their security proposition for metros operating in urban centres and multi-use railway stations. It was felt that the security proposition from Smiths Detection could be introduced as a smart city use case and showcased under the smart cities mission. Also discussed were the center – state dynamics in the context of project funding with an emphasis on self-sustaining/revenue generating projects being preferred. Members expressed the need to engage with stakeholders such as the Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs, NITI Aayog, etc. to gauge the government’s current and new thinking on urban rejuvenation, ICT infrastructure, sustainability, safety and security, clean energy, smart services, etc. The Commercial sector of the U.S. Embassy offered to raise the issue with stakeholders for better focus and informed the members that the new Minister Counselor for Commercial Affairs at the Embassy would arrive in September 2022.

AMCHAM’s Karnataka Chapter, in partnership with Christel House, hosted an engaging and informative session on August 24th to discuss the changing CSR landscape. The session covered challenges faced by both donors and NGOs covering funding cycle, fund utilization certificates, due diligence, project reports and expectations of CSR donors, corporates as well as practical issues faced by NGOs. This was followed by a campus tour of Christel House to showcase the exemplary work done by the team in educating youth. The group was met and received by Mr. Bart Peterson, President and CEO, Christel House International USA, Mr. Morty Ballen, Senior Vice President, Global Academics, Christel House International, Mr. Joe Schneider, Senior Vice President, Treasurer and Chief Financial Officer, Christel House International and Mr. Jaison Mathew, CEO, Christel House India. The event was attended by CSR leaders from Teleflex, GE, Honeywell, First American, State Street and others.