Microsoft to invest $1 bn in digital education, inclusion in Mexico

Microsoft Corporation CEO Satya Nadella said here during a meeting with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto that the technology giant would invest around $1 billion to promote digital education and inclusion in the Latin American country.

During Thursday’s meeting at the Los Pinos presidential residence, Nadella said the investment would be carried out between this year and 2018, the Mexican president’s office said in a statement.

“At the meeting, they (Peña Nieto and Nadella) talked about the evolution and strengthening of Microsoft’s presence in Mexico over two decades, and also about the future of telecommunications” globally, the statement said.

Nadella expressed support for economic reforms carried out Peña Nieto administration, while the Mexican president thanked Microsoft for its role in a campaign to boost digital education in Mexico.

The Microsoft chief noted that his company had promoted micro, small and mediumsize enterprises through its efforts to spur digital education and inclusion.

After their meeting, Peña Nieto and Nadella posed for photographers and talked with students attending the capital’s Mexican Youth Institute under a Microsoft scholarship, including some entrepreneurs with successful projects.

Among them was Alejandro Cantu, founder and CEO of SkyAlert, which issues seismic warnings in Mexico to millions of users.

Founded four years ago as a fourperson operation, SkyAlert now employs 75 workers and went from a company retransmitting information from Mexico’s seismic alert system to a service with its own earthquake detection and measurement network.

“Mexicans can now know how strong a quake was as soon as the alarm goes off, when previously it was just a warning,” Cantu said.

“Microsoft provides the technology platform we use to reach millions of Mexicans; it provides us the security and use of the cloud. It’s helped us not just in the development area but with a program to support entrepreneurs,” he added.

SkyAlert has been so successful that it now plans to expand operations beyond Mexico, with Cantu saying the company is currently studying the possibility of taking its seismicalert technology to California.