India as an Innovation Hub

I was reading Navi Radjou's recent blog post on the HBR site on entitled "Is India an Innovation Giant... or Pygmy?". Given that I just got back from India last week, I had some thoughts that I wanted to share.

My company, Symphony Services, provides product engineering services for software, telecom and web-based companies, so innovation is critical. As expected, we have a significant segment of our delivery operations in India, so India's ability to act as an innovation partner is key to our success. That being said, I see a few issues that can impact India's ability to continue filling the cup: Hubris and Infrastructure.

1. Hubris: India, Inc. has to stop reading it's own press clippings. I've heard predictions that by 2025 India will own ALL product R&D and that US personnel at software companies will simply be sales and marketing functions. This has 2 implications for me. First that there is a discounting of the importance of contact with the end customer in creating innovation products and services. It's the same kind of "we know better than the market" that is the battle cry of most engineering organizations. I saw it when at Kyocera and the paraphrase Chip Heath of 'Make it Stick' fame, that's why your remote control has 53 buttons. Secondly, it presumes that the rest of the world is either standing still or will just 'get dumb' at the same time. Not happening. Lastly, it seems as if no one realizes that this kind of message will play very poorly with the same people that they want to sell to.

2. Infrastructure. Anyone who's been to India knows what I'm talking about. A 2 hour commute to go 10km is insane. And the prospect of adding thousands of more $2500 cars to the current state of affairs is just a bad idea. Look at the impact that the creation of the national highway system had on the US economy in the 60's. It allowed the population to spread out, create jobs through the construction and the resulting housing boom that followed as people could commute to city centers. And the ability to facilitate interstate commerce was a boon to all sectors of the economy. With a similar investment, the potential for the majority of the population to begin to reap some of the benefits of the ITO/BPO boom would create dramatic change in the economy and create more options for entrepreneurs to thrive, not just in the tech sector, but in all aspects of the economy. Infrastructure would grease the skids for the Indian economy and spur the creation of new companies and fortunes to battle the existing oligopoly that exists today.