Entrepreneurial India (or is it?). Why Indians make successful entrepreneurs, but perhaps only when they have emigrated

I had the good fortune to spend 10 days in India in September, visiting Delhi and Bangalore for totally different reasons. I flew into Delhi, where I had last been when back-packing in 1983 before undertaking the 18 day Annapurna Circuit, the year after it opened to the West. Same old, same old in terms of population density, but many more road vehicles clog the roads.

This was with the Vice Chancellor of Cambridge University, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, which he likes shortening to Borys. He was on a mission to connect Cambridge academia to high levels of government and setting up a council of influential high level Indian academics, politicians and business people. I also met the founder and CEO of the largest Indian Angel network.

I had been to Bangalore four years ago to oversee a consultancy project designing an RFID project for Butlins. Since then the population has gone up by 2 million (ie 25%) and the roads have got worse. Here I met many entrepreneurs and support organisations, usually attached to universities. Borys was promoting a Bangalore-Cambridge startup connection, having set up an academic equivalent two years ago.

So, what did I learn from my visit? (these are, of course, my own views):

• Annual GDP growth down to 5.3%, which is worrying them (the last time the UK had 5% growth was in 1988)
• Significant inflation – 10+% annually, with petrol going up 10% in the last month
• Power outages increasing, as peak power is up to 15% above capacity in some areas
• Interest rates 10% to 16%
• Medical technology has a mass market, but their need is 75% of the functionality of the West, at 10% of the cost
• 1.2 billion people, but only 32 million file an income tax return
• Infosys (Bangalore IT company), took on 150 people every working day in the last year. Now 180K staff
• Despite the reputation (India has over 30 million small trading businesses), technology entrepreneurialism within India is stifled, due to:
• Corporates are soaking up competent staff (despite the economic unease)
• Family pressures to dissuade males from taking financial risks (ie Get a job!)
• Some bureaucratic obstacles to forming companies
• Tax system – in terms of encouraging financial risk
• External funding shortage – early days, but there is only 1 Business Angel per 1 million people in India and circa 1 per 3,000 people in the UK. Few VCs
• Talk of corruption, but I saw no evidence

And how can India and Camdata connect?

Primarily to provide lower cost development services from India to the UK. There are not many opportunities to bring Indian technology into the UK.

Camdata has worked on numerous international projects over the last 30 years. To discuss how camdata can help facilitate your project ideas, contact us.

Previous Blogs:

Why I've Jumped Ship from Apple to Android

Visiting the Mobile World Conference

The Internet of Things