Steps to develop and promote Indian EMS

What will it take for the last great emerging market to become an EMS player?

By Mark Zetter

To paint a picture of the large subcontinent of India, I refer to Octavio Paz, the Nobel laureate, poet and onetime Mexican ambassador to the country. In In Light of India, Paz writes: "The first thing that surprised me about India, as it has surprised so many others, was the diversity created by extreme contrast: modernity and antiquity, luxury and poverty, sensuality and asceticism, carelessness and efficiency, gentleness and violence; a multiplicity of castes and languages, gods and rites, customs and ideas, rivers and deserts, plains and mountains, cities and villages, rural and industrial life, centuries apart in time and neighbors in space."

Another contrast I experienced on a recent trip there presented itself as a question in my mind. It came as I exited the terminal at Indira Ghandi International Airport in New Delhi at 2 a.m., walking with my luggage and searching for my driver, whom, I was told by our client, would be bearing a nameplate.

I stepped outside. The area immediately surrounding the terminal was dirty. Stray cats and dogs roamed freely across the open ground. The smell in the cool, early-morning air was...interesting. Dozens upon dozens of taxis, far more than what seemed necessary at that hour, idled nearby. The drivers ventured far from their taxis, visiting with one another. This activity played out more like a recurring nightly get-together than a disciplined, eager-to-earn-a-rupee, business endeavor designed to place food on the table and build wealth.

My driver found me before I found him. (I suspect a tall, Caucasian male with gray hair wearing business casual stood out starkly among the sea of dark hair, colorful saris, turbines and sandals). He opened the door. As I entered I thought: Is this really a good place to design and build VoIP equipment?

In 1991, India found itself nearly bankrupt with no more than three weeks of foreign currency left in its reserves. To help address this, the government began deregulating certain enterprises. Enter Aroun Shourie. Although occasionally controversial, Shourie is one of a group of well-known thinkers changing the Indian mindset on deregulation. Shourie is minister of state and executioner of privatization in the recently displaced BJP-led coalition government. India continues its privatization efforts to this day, inviting NGOs to invest and help manage, or to purchase outright, previously government-run enterprises, while continuing to implement measures to further open its economy to the world.

No one can deny India is the last great emerging market. But unlike China, which has grown tremendously over the past 20 years, India still lacks many basic infrastructures. Phones, electricity, water and roads can challenge even the most veteran traveler. Take, for instance, cellphones. Whereas one can purchase a handset in China and rely on using the phone anywhere in the country, India's infrastructure can necessitate purchasing a new phone for each of the nation's states. Meanwhile, China will soon, if not already, lay claim to having one of the most extensive railroad distribution systems in the world.