It is being organised by the government of Odisha under the BharatNetra initiative in partnership with the Singapore-headquartered Global Finance & Technology Network (GFTN).
Photo: SNS
Odisha’s commitment to shaping India’s digital and economic future was underscored on Wednesday with the announcement of the inaugural Black Swan Summit India, to be held in Bhubaneswar on 5-6 February.
It is being organised by the government of Odisha under the BharatNetra initiative in partnership with the Singapore-headquartered Global Finance & Technology Network (GFTN). The Summit is set to position Odisha as a nation-building platform for India’s next phase of digital-led growth.
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President Droupadi Murmu and Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi will grace the Summit, which reflects Odisha’s transition from policy articulation to execution in AI, FinTech, and InsurTech.
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With participation from over 1,700 delegates from across 24 countries and nearly 100 speakers from 5 continents (North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Africa) will attend the summit. Black Swan Summit India will convene global and national policymakers, regulators, financial institutions, technology leaders, startups, investors, and academics for an execution-oriented dialogue.
It reinforces the role of states as engines of national transformation, aligned with India’s Viksit Bharat 2047 vision.
Rather than focusing on technology adoption alone, Odisha is reframing digital policy around measurable outcomes — jobs, skills, enterprise creation, and global competitiveness.
“Odisha is not preparing to merely participate in the global digital economy; we intend to help shape it, as a frontline contributor to Viksit Bharat,” said Vishal Kumar Dev, Additional Chief Secretary, Electronics & Information Technology.
“Our focus is on operationalising AI and digital finance in ways that deliver real economic value and long-term institutional capacity.”
Odisha’s approach is to convert this national advantage into local execution with global relevance, demonstrating how states can lead digital-led growth, employment creation, and global integration.
This includes deploying AI, FinTech, and InsurTech as workforce multipliers, particularly beyond Tier-I cities, and positioning Odisha as a credible destination for global capability centres, digital finance infrastructure, and long-horizon investment.
BharatNetra was forged during the January 2025 visit of the President of Singapore, Mr. Tharman Shanmugaratnam, to Odisha.
While several MoUs were signed during that visit, the partnership with GFTN has moved decisively into execution, in close collaboration with the state, and is already delivering tangible outcomes.
For Odisha, GFTN’s global ecosystem spanning innovators, entrepreneurs, capital providers, and policymakers acts as an institutional bridge into trusted global digital finance networks. The partnership aligns skilling with real industry demand, accelerates ecosystem maturity in FinTech, InsurTech, and AI, and ensures that policy ambition translates into skills, jobs, enterprises, and long-term capital.
Odisha’s partnership with GFTN through BharatNetra offers a blueprint for how state governments can strengthen national competitiveness by connecting to the global digital economy. Through GFTN’s network across more than 130 countries, Odisha gains direct access to innovators, investors, and policymakers enabling the state to scale digital finance with a strong focus on investment attraction, workforce readiness, and the establishment of global capability centres, said Sopnendu Mohanty, Group CEO, GFTN.
The Black Swan Summit India marks a decisive step in Odisha’s ambition to establish Bhubaneswar as a nationally and globally connected centre for AI-enabled FinTech, InsurTech, and global capability services.
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