Global search engine Google is offering a nine-month course to Indian techies to develop global and local applications on its Android platform in partnership with the Silicon Valley-based start-up Udacity."We are also offering 1,000 scholarships with Tata Trusts to developers selected on merit through an online process by Accenture," Google India managing director Rajan Anandan told reporters here on Monday.Udacity will provide Android Nanodegree to Indian developers after the course, designed to help them learn new skills and advance their careers from anywhere on any device."The programme is meant to bridge the gap in creating world-class applications (apps) by the Indian developer community, as just two percent of the top 1,000 apps on Google Play were created by Indian developers," said Anandan.By offering the Udacity course at Rs.9,800 per month and free scholarships for the meritorious, Google plans to ensure that 10 percent of applications on Android are built by Indian developers over the next three years.Google and Tata Trusts will fund 500 scholarships each.
"Our mission is to democratise education for everyone, to help people get jobs they want and they dream of. We are glad to launch the Android Nanodegree course in India in partnership with Google and Tata Trusts," said Udacity founder and chief executive Sebastian Thrun."Through this initiative with Google, we hope to build the digital ecosystem and create a sustainable difference to empower communities across the country," said Tata Trusts development manager Ganesh Neelam said.The need to build mobile application developers on a large scale stems from their acute shortage worldwide, especially in developing countries like India where 65 percent of users access internet on mobile as against 15 percent in China and 12-13 percent in the US.Of the 350 million internet users in India currently, about 150 million of them access net on smart phones, as against 20 million of 100 million users in 2011.According to a survey by the Indian Internet Mobile Association, of the estimated 500 million internet users in 2017, 400 million will browse or surf the net on smart phones, indicating the huge potential for developing hundreds of mobile apps to meet their multiple needs.