Life goes on ..........................

The article in Fortune that I posted earlier is a collection of all things bad about India. When only the bad things are written about, it makes the country appear bad. One of the sources the author of that article used was 'In Spite of the Gods', a book by Edward Luce. I have copied and pasted a review of that book that appeared in Business Week a week ago (available in the BW website http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_07/b4021105.htm?chan=globalbiz_asia_management). This book portrays the good and the bad in India which provides a better picture of reality. Read on...... The Indian Paradox IN SPITE OF THE GODS The Strange Rise of Modern India By Edward Luce Doubleday; 383pp; $26 (Readers' Reviews below)Editor's Review The Good A graphic, and deeply personal, portrayal of India today. The Bad The author's prescriptions for change are hardly profound. The Bottom Line A balanced chronicle of the often contradictory dynamics that are driving the country....

PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE ON INDIA THAT APPEARED IN FORTUNE.COM TODAY. If you wish to read the article on the fortune site, use the link http://money.cnn.com/2007/02/08/news/international/pluggedin_murphy_india.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2007020906 This article is a wake-up call for those of us who think India is already way up there. But it also clearly shows us the many different inefficiencies that we can wring out of the system that is democratic India. With all these inefficiencies, we still manage to remain top of mind to most international businesses - imagine wringing out just 50% of each of these inefficiencies! What we need is a plan with clear timelines to make sure we can measure our progress each day, an index of some sort. This article gives us the baseline to start from. India the Superpower? Think again By Cait Murphy, Fortune assistant managing editor February 9 2007: 6:29 AM EST NEW YORK (Fortune) -- Plug in the words "India" and "superpower...

I am Indian and I am not defending India. I am just amazed by the level of economic activity in India. If you ignore India, it will be at your peril. I visit this country every month and the changes under way are amazing. India has the cheapest mobile phone rates in the world. The new budget airlines in India provide the cheapest airfares in the world. India has the largest proportion of youngsters in the world and this trend will continue well into the second half of this century. India’s democracy will reach critical mass in the next 15 years - the bane of any democracy is that the majority of the voting population whether educated or uneducated decide who governs the country; in India to this day, populous leaders get elected only because of the majority being illiterate and not knowing what is best for their own future. This will change in the next 15 years because of the major educational efforts under way. And at that point, India would reach the final inflection point in its ris...

Smoke on the water, fire in the sky! Sure I love Deep Purple. Love IPods too. And now here comes the IPhone. No buttons, just a touch sensitive screen. Runs on an embedded version of Mac OSx. Jobs' revelation of the phone at the MacWorld Expo sent Apple stock up 8% and RIM stock down 7% - plus sending tremors across the mobile manufacturer world. Cisco filed law suit against the IPhone name - though talks are going on to settle the issue. Sure, Cisco could settle for a low single digit royalty for the name that would just drop to its bottomline with no effort at all from Chambers. And probably corporate purchasing officers using an Iphone as their own mobile would have some bias toward the Iphone brand name when it comes to sourcing their IP phones. Will this be the next Ipod? 200 million in 5 yrs? More? $499 - $599 price seems a bit prohibitive. But if users start downloading from Itunes to their Iphone directly, think of the revenues Cingular and its brethren could book from data...

Read a good article on pricing for small businesses in the Businessweek website. It has special relevance for me since it is very tough to price consulting projects across customer segments. The usual type of pricing based on your costs or on what the competition is charging is the reason for many small businesses going bust. The best way to price something is through a conjoint study; but for small businesses that cannot afford it, the better option would be to ask customers and find out the value being added in terms of costs saved by the customer through using your product or service. Another option is to ask your customer what their alternative would be if your product or service were not available. In many cases you may find that they really do not have alternatives and this means you can charge a premium! Pricing also has to be always customer specific, meaning you need to charge differently for each customer segment. So bad pricing strategies or lack of any strategy leaves money...

I've been thinking of blogging for sometime now and got to it finally today, 11/01/07. Idea is to make my thoughts on almost everything that's happening around the world or just in my own life and even abstract stuff in my grey matter, public. If you care to read my ruminations and make something of it in life, great; if not, still ok since at least you know what I think - not many people in this world get to do even that ..... make their thoughts accessible to others. My feeling today is that my blog will have more on business and entrepreneurship than any other topic. This could change since the whole world and everything around us is about change - people running around chasing cheese (due credits to Spencer Johnson) and making or breaking themselves in the process. Hey, I read about the Stubhub deal by Ebay! Cool stuff. The founders have about 26 - 28% stake in it and they stand to make a good chunk of money out of the $310 million deal. And they both are in their early 30s...