After the final day in Mumbai, Secretary Locke and delegates from the 24 U.S. businesses who travelled to India on the six-day high-tech trade mission to India wrapped up their business.

Secretary Locke said, “This trade mission was a resounding success.  For some companies on our trip, ‘success’ was an initial meeting or consultation with Indian government or business leaders that will lead to deals down the road. For others, success was more immediate with some companies leaving India on the cusp of making multimillion dollar sales.  Either way, these companies have made important inroads into one of the most promising high-technology markets in the world.”

On Friday morning, Secretary Locke met with the executive committee of the U.S- India Importers’ Council, an initiative developed to support Indian companies that import goods and services from the United States.  The mission of this Council is to advance President Obama’s National Export Initiative, and to support the efforts of Indian companies that import products from the U.S.
 
Locke then visited Mumbai’s legendary Dabbawala Association organization to learn about their unique logistics operation that delivers home-cooked food to hundreds of thousands of people daily.  Association president Raghunath Medge provided Locke with an overview of the organization’s labeling and sorting methodology and the dispatch process. Dabbawala’s lunch delivery service has been cited as a model of entrepreneurship and supply chain management at the grass-roots level. In the afternoon, Locke engaged in multiple bilateral meetings with Indian officials.

During the six-day mission, Locke met with India’s Minister of Commerce Anand Sharma, Minister of Finance Pranab Mukherjee, Minister of Defence M.K Anthony, and Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia, among other high-level government officials. Locke stressed the importance of the U.S.-India economic relationship and discussed avenues for enhancing this critical partnership, and raised longstanding and emerging issues – including market access barriers and intellectually property protection – facing U.S. companies in the Indian market.
 
Locke highlighted the importance of the aerospace sector to the U.S.-India trade relationship at Aero India 2011, India’s largest aerospace trade event.  He also met with high-level CEOs, including Ratan N. Tata, Chairman of Tata Group, and Mukesh Ambani,Chairman of Reliance Industries LTD.

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