'India-France will harness AI's potential for global good'

Modi is in Paris for an AI summit. French ambassador writes the scope of the two nations’ strategic partnership goes beyond security, and is sharply focused on innovation.

“A giant in world history, with a decisive role to play in the future, a strategic partner, a friend.” President Macron’s words celebrate the outstanding relations between India and France. PM Modi’s visit to Paris as co-chair of the two-day AI Action Summit hosted by France (Feb 10-11), provides a new opportunity to expand France and India’s partnership. This visit follows cross visits of the Indian PM to Paris in 2023 and President Macron’s visit to India on its 75th Republic Day in 2024.

Our longstanding relationship is based on solid fundamentals: unwavering mutual trust and respect; approaching this relationship as equals; and a profound understanding of our mutual ambitions, even during difficult times. This has led to wide-ranging security and defence cooperation.

The high-profile stopover of the French navy’s Carrier Strike Group (CSG) in India last month was a large-scale event. The CSG’s joint exercises with India’s armed forces offered a compelling illustration of France and India’s shared belief in a free, open, inclusive, secure and peaceful Indo-Pacific.

In these fundamentals lies the success of France and India’s strategic partnership, based on constant innovation to meet the challenges of our times. “Because, as partners, aren’t we first and foremost inventing the future together, through the power of our imagination, our ability to innovate, and our willingness to learn from our differences and experiences?” These words were uttered not in 2025, but in 1998 — by President Jacques Chirac, when our strategic partnership was established. The same point could be made today.

This vision shows that, from its very inception, the idea of the Indo-French ‘strategic partnership’ was not limited to security affairs. The ever-evolving partnership has become universal, extending from seabed to space. It includes improving economic prosperity, ensuring sustainable development, and building a secure and peaceful Indo-Pacific region.

Among challenges ahead, artificial intelligence (AI) is the future of our cooperation. France and India already possess strong assets in terms of research capabilities, talent, and data. PM Modi and President Macron foresaw great potential for future cooperation in 2019, when they endorsed the Indo-French Roadmap on Cybersecurity and Digital Technology. India and France share a common vision of AI governance for the development of a safe, open, secure, and trustworthy AI, its responsible and ethical use and solutions, as founding members of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence. Based on their dynamic cooperation on digital public infrastructure, India and France will harness the potential of AI for human development and the global commons.

French and Indian innovation ecosystems are already closely linked. French digital companies — whether major groups or startups — not only have a strong presence in India, but are also willing to enhance their involvement in India’s ambitious digital programmes. This ambition is embodied by the French Tech Bangalore-India, launched in 2019, which has brought together hundreds of individuals, startups and corporate members from over 20 cities in India and France. Similarly, digital and telecommunications are key investment sectors for Indian companies in France. Indian startups are soon to be incubated at Station-F, the world’s biggest startup campus based in Paris.

The launch of the ‘India AI Mission’ in March 2024 has brought renewed opportunities. France is eager to deepen its partnership with India on AI as the mission unfolds to develop computing access, improve data quality, develop AI capabilities, attract top talent, foster industry collaboration, providing startup risk capital, ensuring socially impactful AI projects and bolstering ethical AI.

Much has been done, and the AI Action Summit co-chaired by India will undoubtedly shed light on India and France’s joint work in the five dedicated working groups to tackle key issues for tomorrow: Public Interest AI, Future of Work, Innovation & Culture, Trust in AI, and Global AI Governance.

India’s role will be key to help respond to three questions we all face. How can we massively develop AI technologies and uses across the world? How can we ensure nobody is left behind and preserve our freedoms in the AI revolution? How can we ensure uses of AI respect our humanistic values, and that technology serves society and public interest?

The AI Action Summit will provide strong impetus to our forward-looking cooperation. As announced by President Macron and PM Modi in Jan 2024, the year 2026 will be the India-France Year of Innovation. Many concrete initiatives will be taken to bring our respective innovation ecosystems closer to tackle the economic, environmental, and technological challenges the world faces. The year will also promote a common vision for a responsible and inclusive innovation model that will help build a shared future — as former President Jacques Chirac had hoped on the signing of the Indo-French strategic partnership more than 25 years ago.

Thierry Mathou is the Ambassador of France to India

The opinion piece was published in The Times of India on 11th February 2025.