Where exactly is India innovating? Services, sure. Put products/original content, questionable?
And YES, there are significant innovations happening on a small to medium level in many areas.
But I am talking about the global game changers. The big kahuna, the mother of all inventions, the next best thing. ..... Okay, cool down.
Apart from the Offshore Services Industry - when looked at from a macro economic level - a true game changer, not much has happened, has it? Oh the questions this raises (and I will keep it confined to technology innovations)
- Why hasn't India produced an internationally recognizable Apple or Yahoo or Google or a Microsoft?
- Why are some of the most celebrated movies in India usually a hotch potch (uncredited) copies of foreign movies, and even more so the music? And this is an industry all about creativity.
- Why isn't there a Indian cellphone company a la Nokia, Samsung or Motorola?
- Why was VoIP not invented in India?
- ..... YouTube, Skype, Blogging......
- At a more granular level - Java/J2EE, Ruby on Rails, Linux, ......
Why are we so proud of India as the world's back office? Why not the Front Office? Why are we not the architects of tomorrow - why do we remain the engineers?
The IMF says India will become the 3rd largest economy in the world in 2007 by PPP . Since PPP is a relative index, let me propose one more. Where would India stand if measured by an Innovation index ?
I promise more on this subject in future posts
Reading Material : Check out these series of articles by Arindam Banerji on Indian Innovation - Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 & Part 4. You may or may not agree with his viewpoints, but he was onto something and he has compiled quite a list of Indian innovations at all levels.
