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Sambhar Mafia - Cooked To Kill!

Tuesday, June 06, 2006

NRN on Infy’s Past and Future

Yale Global’s Nayan Chanda interviews N R Narayanamurthy for the Online edition of Yale Global. NRN talks about some of the initial roadblocks during the license raj. He also explains some of the current issues like the challenges in managing a massive global workforce and in managing diversity.

Chanda: The rapid growth of outsourcing is very good news for a country like India or China. But one sees an increasing concern in Europe and the US about white-collar jobs leaving the country and going outside. Do you see that this could be a drag on your business?

Murthy: You know my view is that people in glass houses should not throw stones at others. After all, what we are doing is what we were preached to do by the rest of the nations. My European friends, my American friends, told me umpteen times in the 1980s how India should become more and more open, how India should open up its borders, how India should reduce its tariffs, how India should allow competition from multinationals, etc. I agreed with all of them. All we’ve been doing is implementing the ideas that they have been propounding. So, at this point in time, just because the shoe pinches a little bit, I don’t think we should go back on those principles.

So my view is, at the end of that day is that we’re making corporations in the US, in Europe, in Japan, in other countries, more competitive, not just for selling in their own countries, but in other countries. So just as we accepted liberalization, just as we opened up our borders, I believe that western nations, too, would gain from such open access.

The above reply by NRN is very much similar to Tom Friedman's response to the anti-outsourcing lobby in The World is Flat.

4 Comments:

  • Its exactly what Nandan had told to Thomas Friedman during the height of the book's popularity ..

    By Blogger Cogito, at 8:43 PM  

  • Tks for ur daily posts! Short, clear and infomative. Btw, I was wondering... Are you an IIMB alumni (IIMB mafia in sidebar)? I was exchange student there last year and will be back soon in India.

    Keep writing...

    By Blogger Indiafreak, at 6:22 AM  

  • @Cogito,
    Thanks for clarification

    @Erasmus-in-India,
    Yes, I'm an alumnus of IIMB. enjoy your stay in Bangalore.

    By Blogger Kaps, at 11:04 AM  

  • The globalization sentiments both NRN, Nandan, and Mr. Friedman expressed sound similar because they are typical rhetoric expousing the benefits of pure economic theory. --None of them are purposefully copying each other's words.

    The argument that globalization increases ecomonic opportunities for more people-- "making the pie bigger"-- is indeed popular with Infosys, and also IBM, Accenture, George W. Bush, Saudi Oil... as everyone has incentive to promote the liberalization of foreign markets and abolishment of tariffs, quotas impeding free trade.

    Rather than hear yet another prominent industry expert or CEO blow hot air extolling the long-term benefits of economic globalization, I'd prefer an insightful, comprehensive analysis from our leaders on the environmental, cultural, and legalistic implications "globalization" entails.

    Then we'd finally be free of all the neocolonial and tedious FlatWorld-esque books.

    By Blogger Laura, at 12:58 PM  

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