What is the U.S.-India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET)?

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Why in News?

Recently, the National Security Advisors of India and the US led the inaugural meeting of the iCET in Washington, DC.

About the U.S.-India initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET):

It was launched by the US President and Indian Prime Minister on the sidelines of the Quad summit on May 2022.
Goal: To elevate and expand Indo-U.S. strategic technology partnership and defense industrial cooperation between the governments, businesses, and academic institutions of the two countries.
The initiative will be spearheaded by the National Security Council Secretariat in India and the US National Security Council.
The initiative would help forge links between the government, academia, and industry in areas such as AI, quantum computing, 5G/6G, biotech, space, and semiconductors.
Under iCET, the two sides have identified six focus areas of co-development and co-production:
- strengthening innovation ecosystems;
- defense innovation and technology cooperation;
- resilient semiconductor supply chains;
- space;
- STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) talent;
- next-generation telecom;

Q1) What is quantum computing?

Quantum computing is a multidisciplinary field comprising aspects of computer science, physics, and mathematics that utilizes quantum mechanics to solve complex problems faster than on classical computers.

Source: India, US relaunch commercial dialogue on supply chain, establish semiconductor partnership