DailyPost 1021
FAILING TO SCALE
Whatever might be the area, whatever might be the skill, whatever might be the technology, in the Indian ecosystem we generally fail to scale. While Tatas and Ambanis provide some consolation and are in some ways exceptions to this rule, rest at best reach the Indian glass ceiling and are not able to break it. The newest of these are the group of unicorns which have emerged out of the start up revolution. The one billion barrier itself has been a difficult one and getting on the latter side of single digit still seems to be a dream run.
Aspirations run dry or ecosystem comes in way of scaling up or the courage, grit and perseverance is lacking will be matter of business research for the present context, the fact is we don’t scale beyond two or three billion dollars generally. The earlier Indian IT behemoths, the triumvirate of TCS, Infosys and Wipro scaled to Indian levels, bringing cheer to the middle class, but did not make a mark anywhere near the Googles, Appples and Microsofts of the world. Stagnating in their carefully cushioned conventional wisdom, the Indian IT industry is giving a go by to the disruptive technologies sweeping the world.
Huawei was founded in 1987, Alibaba in 1999, Baidu in 2000, DJI in 2006 and dozens of the other IT companies are giving US and the the famed Silicon Valley a run of their money. These companies are younger to ours and did not the have the benefit of an English speaking technical manpower. Global ambitions doesn’t seem to be a part of our DNA, as seen in our pioneering companies. The present Start Up revolution is also maintaining the same calm and poise .
Huawei is ahead by 18 months in R & D compared to any company in the world, in a technology, 5G, wherein even a single day counts. Research does not throw up tangible prototypes worthy of outright commercialisation, business models are not created robust to scale and IT companies too shy away from any form of research and development. Entrepreneurs of yesteryears who made a booty out of IT are not interested in either mentoring or investing. IT, research and the country is at crosswords.
INDIAN DOES NOT HAVE THE DISCRETION TO SCALE OR NOT TO SCALE.
Sanjay Sahay