Moving Up the Chain, Into the Water: Critical Resources in India for Advanced Computing

India’s push to strengthen its critical materials and advanced manufacturing supply chains highlights a challenge facing countries around the world: securing access to materials requires more than mining and manufacturing capacity—it requires processing, energy, and water. This talk examines India’s efforts across critical minerals, semiconductors, batteries, and data centers, and explores how water availability and energy demands are becoming critical constraints on industrial growth. It also considers the broader implications for technology supply chains and the competition for resources needed to support the next generation of manufacturing.

Guest speaker:

Amit Kapoor, PhD, is a leading expert on international competitiveness, India’s economy, and democratic development. He is Honorary Chairman at the Indian Institute for Competitiveness, Chair for the Social Progress Imperative & Shared Value Initiative in India, member of the University of San Diego’s Advisory Board and has been a lecturer at Stanford University.

He has authored The Age of Awakening: The Story of the Indian Economy Since Independence, and co-authored Riding the Tiger (with Wilfried Aulber), The Elephant Moves (with Amitabh Kant), Jyotirlingams (with Bibek Debroy), and Competitiveness Roadmap for India @100 (with Christian Ketels and Michael Porter). His most recent book, Disrupting Democracies is published by the Bertelsmann Foundation. He has also been the driving force behind, and author of, the India City Competitiveness Report, the India State Competitiveness Report, the India Manufacturing Competitiveness Report, the India State Sustainability Report, the India Livability Report, and the Creative Economy of Indian Cities and States Report, that are published on a periodic basis, and numerous other reports on India’s economic, social, and political environment. His work also forms the basis of prestigious State, City, and Corporate Competitiveness awards in India.

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Our series on “Topics in International Technology Management | Challenges and Solutions for Critical Materials in Energy and Electronics" begins September 24, 2026 and continues until December 3, 2026. Seminars will be held most Thursdays, 4:30 PM – 5:50 PM.  The series is available to Stanford students for credit; register for MATSCI 402A “Topics in International Technology Management,” also cross-listed as EE-402A, EASTASN 402A and EALC-402A, 1 unit S/NC. 

To attend by Zoom, please register here.

To attend in-person, please register over Eventbrite here.