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The collaboration with one of Europe's foremost nations is now shifting from a purely transactional approach to a more transformational one
Dr Mohit Anand & Rajesh Mehta
Updated – June 13, 2026 11:03 AM IST
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India-France relations have become stronger and more resilient in the past decades, and their cooperation has been further accelerated beyond the three crucial pillars of defence and security, civil nuclear cooperation, and economic and trade partnership. Trade relations between India and France have witnessed steady growth, with bilateral trade reaching an impressive $9.7 billion in FY26 (till November 2025). To broaden and diversify their areas of cooperation, India and France are exploring multiple avenues of collaboration, such that the partnership evolves and shifts from a ‘transactional’ to more of a ‘transformational’ relationship between the two. Beyond the established troika of collaboration, India and France are now particularly focusing on three key areas of cooperation, namely, technology, startups and artificial intelligence ecosystems.
The Third India-France AI Policy Roundtable held in November 2025, as a pre-summit engagement for India’s AI Impact Summit 2026, brought together government, industry, startups, and academia from both countries. The dialogue focused on strengthening cooperation in AI infrastructure, research, industry partnerships, and responsible AI governance, highlighting India’s digital public infrastructure and France’s commitment to human-centric AI. French President Emmanuel Macron visited India from February 17 to 19 this year and participated in the AI Impact Summit, and the two leaders also jointly inaugurated the 2026 India-France Year of Innovation.
During the visit, Bharat Innovates 2026 was announced by the PM Modi, extending an invitation to global leaders, CEOs, investors and universities to collaborate with India’s innovation ecosystem. Bharat Innovates is a national initiative to identify, mentor, and showcase India’s most promising technology ventures from Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and Centrally Funded Technical Institutes, bringing selected ventures to a global audience of investors, industry leaders, policymakers, research institutions, and technology partners. It is designed as a global accelerator for innovations from Indian HEIs, thereby building a long-term collaboration bridge between India’s innovation ecosystem (startups, HEIs, labs and research parks) and global stakeholders such as corporates, investors, incubators/accelerators, universities, research institutes, governments and overseas alumni.
Strengthening partnerships, advancing progress.
PM @narendramodi has departed for the 2-nation visit to France and Slovakia. During the visit, PM will engage with the leadership of both countries. PM will inaugurate ‘Bharat Innovates’ event at Nice, participate in the G7 Summit… pic.twitter.com/GJV7K5aOG8
The maiden edition of Bharat Innovates is going to be in Nice, France, from June 14 to 16, 2026. It takes India’s top 120 deeptech startups to Nice to catalyse pilots, co-development, investments, research partnerships, manufacturing and market access. The event will be jointly inaugurated by PM Modi and French President Macron on 14 June during the upcoming visit of PM Modi to France as a special invitee to participate in the G7 Summit to be hosted by France. Both sides aim at leveraging and learning from each other’s technology, digital infrastructure and entrepreneurial ecosystems, thereby driving innovation and growth.
"The deepening of collaborations between India and France is also reflected in areas of academic, research and entrepreneurship, as we are seeing greater student-to-student, academic-to-academic, and government-to-government exchanges to broaden cooperation in diverse sectors such as innovation, science and technology, digital space, climate change, renewable energy, cyberspace, healthcare, sustainable development, to name a few. Avenues of convergence, therefore, between the two nations are limitless," remarked Dr Nicolas Pejout, Executive Vice President, Emlyon Business School, France.
In this context, both leaders acknowledged the importance of advancing scientific knowledge, research and innovation, and the long and enduring engagement between India and France in these areas.
"The visit will give further impetus to an already burgeoning relationship between India and France, which has historically been strong and has been elevated to a Special Global Strategic Partnership in February 2026. Both leaders are expected to review the full spectrum of India-France ties, with special focus on three fast-evolving pillars of collaboration in areas of innovation, tech, startups and AI ecosystem," remarked Randhir Jaiswal, MEA Spokesperson, Government of India.
India-France partnership can also be a catalyst to further strengthen India-EU relations, given the background of the recently concluded talks on the free trade agreements between the two markets. Similarly, India-EU collaboration can expand beyond economic and trade partnership to strengthen in areas related to tech, AI and startup ecosystems that could benefit both regions from their mutual learnings and sharing of practices and knowledge. While France and the EU can provide technology and skills, India can provide them the scale, market reach and learnings that could be a win-win scenario for both.
The upcoming visit of PM Modi to France will provide a boost to multidimensional and multifaceted relations between India and France, from deepening progress on the Horizon 2047 goals with more than 20 outcomes from pioneering AI for humanity, to technology, fostering startups and entrepreneurship, to inclusive growth and a sustainable future, among others.
As remarked by French President Macron, ‘The question is no longer if India innovates, but who will innovate with India’. It epitomises the rise and significance of India’s technology and innovation capabilities, but more so the opportunities it brings for India and for the rest of the world to collaborate with it for a better future. India and France can pool their skillsets to scale up not only for themselves but also for the global good.
The authors, Mohit Anand is a professor of International Business and Strategy at Emlyon Business School, France, and Rajesh Mehta is an international affairs expert working on innovation and public policy.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of THE WEEK.
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