The recent news item about Democrat senator Charles Schumer calling Infosys a chop shop has sparked off a lively debate and understandably drawn a lot of comments from the Indian IT industry. Clearly, political compulsions and an economy that is taking its time to recover are triggering such statements.

This is ironic from an Indian IT industry stand point though. During its heydays ( mid nineties to mid 2000’s), the word global delivery was merely a euphemism for large and multiple development centers in India, for most companies, including the large ones. Likewise, the proportion of global talent was not very significant. In the last few years however, the scale players especially have gone about globalizing their operations more systematically, hired locals, especially from the US, which continues to be the most attractive market notwithstanding the recession, and begun to behave like a global corporation, albeit slowly.

This episode underscores the need for Indian companies and industry associations to focus more and more on brand building to communicate strongly the value being delivered by the global outsourcing industry.

Comments?

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Recently, the WSJ put together two articles, with Clay Shirky arguing that for the former – saying that ‘amid the silly videos and spam are the roots of a new reading and writing culture.’  Nicholas Carr argues for the other side, saying that we are turning into ’shallow thinkers.’  Both articles were interesting; read more at:

Does the Internet make you Dumber?

and

Does the Internet make you Smarter?

It is a topic that we can argue endlessly about, but I’d like to  be optimistic on this, and that’s why maybe I am veering towards the former idea (smarter).  But Carr’s article is more scientifically written and it does have a lot of relevant points. And one of my pet peeves is that the younger generations, with their growing online interactions, are losing out on the rich complexity of face-to-face human interactions.

As with most questions of this type, the answer really is – it depends. Like fire, the Internet is a good servant but bad master.  It’s how we use it and what we use it for that determines the end result.  As long as we still use the skills and techniques that make us what we are – critical, cognitive thinking, ability to sort information and use it relevantly, ability to build on concepts to arrive at newer/better applications – then the Internet is just another layer in our learning process.

What is your take?

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Now, I have my own personal opinions about the Israel flotilla fiasco that occurred about a week ago – however that’s not really something I would want get into here. A point worth making though is how the Israeli Government has set off an intensive media campaign across Twitter, Facebook and other key social media platforms to help restore its reputation. Every few hours, there are new videos uploaded to YouTube and a  regular stream of Twitter updates and blog posts – all demonstrating the ‘responsible’ behavior of the troops while portraying the people in the flotilla as hostile attackers. However the Government didn’t really bargain for the live streams and camera phones that have captured the true story – one that had been circulating around the social media platforms long before the ‘edited’ versions were released.  The social media war had been instigated at the outset when the flotilla began its voyage – indeed armed with Facebook and Twitter profiles, and every detail Flickered and You-tubed, the flotilla got their message across to the world and how!

While the Governments efforts seem to have worked at home to some extent, there is no stopping the wave of condemnation pouring in from across the globe. What is really ironic is that Government is now in a much worse position than it was when the flotilla launched.

Ah, the power of technology and social media!

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I attended the Nasscom Engineering Summit in Bangalore today and there were some pretty interesting observations made in couple of the sessions. While the Nasscom-Booz study has predicted that the engineering services market from India will grow to $50B by 2020, some of the service providers (both captive and third-party) brought in a sense of realism. Krishna Millikkenni of Honeywell said that the road ahead will not be easy and companies will be challenged with everything from infrastructure, governmental regulations etc. In this context, innovation assumes importance as companies will need to figure out ways to overcome challenges.

Wilifred Aulbur, Merceded-Benz, India had some good insights too – his view was that Indians are pretty good at coming up with ideas but the challenge was with execution.  As we know, ideation by itself is pointless if it is not backed by execution. And there lies the challenge for Indian service providers to scale to the next level. Sounds like a familiar problem.

One more point that he mentioned was that 80% of Germany’s economy is made up of SMEs and most of them apparently do not have succession plans. His view is that these companies are ideal M&A targets for Indian companies as they aim to become more globalized.  A member of the audience said that while Indians are known for their flexibility and multi-tasking capabilities, Germans are known for their disciplined approached and he wondered if M&As between these two cultures would work !

Good point – Indian companies need to focus more on carrying an idea to completion to make it to the big league. Your views – will be great to get a few!

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A recent Economist featured a special story on emerging markets and there were some pretty good ones on India & China. The earlier trend was for developed economies to innovate and pass it on to emerging nations. Now, the reverse seems to be happening and hence the phrase “reverse innovation”. There are several examples that can be quoted from the Indian context – where companies have adapted to our own unique needs and done that pretty well. (1) All Mobile phones are equipped with a flashlight to combat the power shortage situation (2) TCS has come up with a water filter that is powered by rice husk which is available in plenty and potentially saving the lives of many (3) Shampoo and soap in smaller sachets to service the needs of the less affluent (4) Dr Devi Shetty’s and his cardiologist team of 40 perform some 600 surgeries a week and the list goes on.

In addition to this, I think the whole business of offshoring as one more innovation from India. Now, we have all the global players in our backyard with similar business models. Offshoring capitalized on the fact that India is a populous country and hence that translated to abundance of talent when compared to western countries. The point is we need to convert what we think as disadvantages into opportunities – something that both India and China are doing well.  Another important point, a lot of these companies are much more profitable than the western counterparts. The profit margins of India n IT companies have been discussed in another blog here – but this holds good in the other examples as well. Time to sit up and take notice and learn too.

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While it’s no news that clean and renewable energy has become a driving force for global economic recovery, what is startling is that a recent report from the Pew Environmental Group indicates China has surpassed the U.S. to become the top investor in clean energy. At Copenhagen, China may have been reluctant to sign an international treaty that heavily restricts its carbon emissions, but on the flip side, private investors have been pouring money into clean energy in the country – to a tune of US $ 34.6 billion over the past five years, almost double the amount spent by the U.S!

India on the other hand ranked 10^th among the G-20 group of countries with an investment of US $2.3 billion. In some ways, we lag far behind China who has also emerged as the No. 1 maker of solar cells for solar panels in recent years as well as the leader in wind-turbine production. With clean energy investments in Asia surging by 37%, riding on the China wave, it becomes imperative for India to consider steps to capitalize on this wave, rather than focusing on catching up with China.

The global clean energy race is on, and China is winning..…for now.

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