Tim Cook begins India visit with high-profile meetings

A temple visit and meetings with top business leaders marked Apple chief executive Tim Cook’s first day in India. Cook, who met some of the country's top iOS developers in a 5-star hotel in Mumbai on Wednesday, tweeted: "Great to hear from some of India's top iOS developers today. Innovative apps and many ideas for the future!"

On his maiden visit to the country, Cook also met officials from the Tata Group and Vodafone India. According to sources, Cook took time out to meet Tata Group chairman Cyrus Mistry and TCS chief executive officer and managing director N Chandrasekaran. The Apple boss also met Vodafone India CEO Sunil Sood and ICICI Bank’s top brass at the country’s largest private sector lender’s corporate headquarters.

Cook, whose every meeting is being closely watched here for cues about Apple’s business plans in India, walked into ICICI Bank Towers in the Bandra Kurla Complex business district here and spent over an hour there, sources said.

He met the bank’s managing director and CEO Chanda Kochhar and executive directors at a closed-door meeting, they said, but refused to divulge what was discussed.

Reports suggested he would also interact with the country’s largest mobile operator Airtel’s top-brass later.

 According to reports, Cook will also meet Bollywood superstar Shahrukh Khan at the latter's residence in Bandra.

 Earlier in the day, Cook, after arriving in Mumbai from China, visited the Siddhivinayak temple in Prabhadevi where he met RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani's son Anant Ambani. The meeting comes at a time when RIL is close to launching its 4G services across the country through Reliance Jio.

During his four-day visit to the country, Cook will also meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and many other industry leaders. Apple had announced on Wednesday that it will establish a design and development accelerator in Bengaluru, an initiative to support engineering talent and accelerate growth in India's iOS developer community.