Prime Minister Narendra Modi would virtually unveil the Bengaluru Technological Summit 2020 on November 19, Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister C.N. Ashwath Narayan said on Wednesday.

“The Prime Minister has agreed to digitally open the 23rd edition of the Bengaluru Technological Summit (BTS) on November 19 and address the gathering virtually,” Narayan told reporters here.

The 3-day summit will focus on innovation and growth in information technology (IT) and biotechnology (BT).

“We are getting an overwhelming response to the summit from the industry and experts despite the Covid pandemic,” said Narayan, who holds the IT, BT and Science and Technology portfolios.

Till date, 25 countries have confirmed participation in the summit.

In the 22nd edition of the summit last year, 21 countries, 250 overseas delegations, 252 speakers and 12,350 visitors participated.

Narayan also said that the state government has decided to set up an Artificial Intelligence (AI) research centre in the city, in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), in view of its potential to find solutions to problems in future.

“As about 60 per cent of the people in the state depend on the agriculture sector for their livelihood, science and technology have to play a greater role in in increasing its contribution to the gross state domestic product to 30 per cent from 16 per cent presently,” he said.

Thrust on the farm sector will also check migration to cities from rural areas and facilitate growth beyond Bengaluru, which is saturated, he added.

“As developments in bio-technology will make a huge impact on agriculture and healthcare, the stakeholder should leverage them for value addition to farm produce and processing. Quality healthcare system can be offered with the innovative applications being developed in biotechnology,” said Narayan.

“Collaboration between academia and industry will usher in an institution-based economy in place of an industry-based economy.”

Infosys co-founder S. Gopalakrishnan, Biocon Chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Karnataka vision group on start-ups chairman Prashant Prakash and IT, BT and S&T Secretary E.V. Ramana Reddy also spoke on the occasion.

The summit will feature multi-track conferences, international exhibition, global innovation alliance, STPI-IT Export awards, Smart Bio awards and Bengaluru Impact awards.

About 250 domain experts, including 80 from overseas, are slated to address the summit on disruptive technologies and innovations from the world over.