The Confederation of Indian Industry announced the 22nd edition of the India Innovation Summit to be held in Bengaluru on July 23 and 24. The summit will focus on strengthening India as a manufacturer and exporter of technology products rather than remaining primarily a services driven economy. The IT and BT minister Priyank Kharge is scheduled to address the summit while the chief minister DK Shivakumar and the union commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal have been invited. CII leaders noted that the organisation has, over the last two decades, concentrated on technology led innovation to drive economic growth and job creation. The former CII president and Infosys co founder Kris Gopalakrishnan observed that with AI driven disruption it is appropriate that this year's theme reflects that reality and that disruption should be leveraged to create momentum for companies and for the country. He emphasised the need to convert disruption into opportunity for firms across the value chain. Speakers drew attention to the country's dependence on imported technology and said India has the potential to develop indigenous products and scale manufacturing for exports. They noted that almost every piece of technology used today is imported and that the nation's major exports are currently services. The Karnataka government was credited for supporting the summit since the first meeting in 2005 and for helping to create the ecosystem required for innovation and in some cases acting as an initial customer. Gopalakrishnan and Kamal Bali, president of Volvo Group India and chairperson of this year's summit, urged greater investment in Karnataka's AI ecosystem including the establishment of data centres. In response to concerns about water scarcity and the water intensive nature of such facilities, organisers indicated that proposed centres would not be large scale and would therefore require limited land and water resources. They said the theme was chosen because AI is expected to be embedded across every sector and that India must build scalable, trusted products that are relevant globally.