Bill Gates Talks About "Fantastic" Relationship With India: "Hired Smart IT Graduates"

Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath recently launched a new podcast series called 'People by WTF' featuring Microsoft founder Bill Gates as the first guest. The two entrepreneurs discussed a variety of topics from artificial intelligence to the debate on capitalism versus socialism and Mr Gates' special relationship with India.

"I've had a fantastic relationship with India starting with the Microsoft experience where we hired some very smart IT graduates, brought them to Seattle. Later they go back, create a development center for us that's now in four locations, 25,000 people. Of course, a lot of the amazing people I work with and have so much fun in the Microsoft success are part of the team who have been hired from India," the tech magnate told Mr Kamath.

The Microsoft founder also highlighted the efforts of CEO Satya Nadella, who, according to him, is "doing a great job." Mr Gates continued, "Top of that list is Satya, who now is doing a great job as CEO. In my digital first career, the connection to India was fun and made a huge difference in what the company was able to achieve. It was during that time that I was kind of learning, oh wow, India is such a study in contrast, first class in so many ways, but still a lot of poverty and challenges."

He also discussed how India became a centre of focus for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. "Vaccines were missing and that is a crime that these diarrhoea, and rotavirus vaccines were being given to rich kids. So I learnt about the Serum Institute of India, making cheap vaccines." Mr Gates continued, "We had to see how we as foreigners form partnerships and not come across in the wrong way. It was a heck of a learning curve."

The billionaire also mentioned that apart from the United States, India is the country they spend their most money on, nearly a billion dollars.