IT Is Not A Magic Wand

Ref rsridhar #: 151

[I am a neonatologist here after finishing my fellowship in one of ivy-league university programs.]

Was that the New Jersey College of Medicine? YLH would be delighted to hear that.

[You see things that do not exist. In medical language, it is called hallucination.]

What do you call it when you SEE things that do not exist -- such as the intellectual superiority of Indians that has enabled them to outperform the rest of the world in IT?

[Where are you from? If from Pakistan, my advice to you: grow up and learn from people like Bilal Ahmed how to interact. If you are from India, I am ashamed of you.]

Actually, there are a few more countries in the region other than India and Pakistan. Have you considered Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives, or Sri Lanka? Or are they below the radar screen of high-flying Indians?

``I must have touched a nerve when I mentioned Chu Ti Ah Medical College!``.

Gymnosophist,

I studied in a medical college in Delhi. Delhi has for many years maintained a high standard of medical education. We have a highly competetive entrance exam for both undergrad and postgrad courses. After doing my undergrad i went to Madras to do my M.D and later migrated to US. I am a neonatologist here after finishing my fellowship in one of ivy-league university programs. I am taking the trouble of informing you of my background just to prove that you have a real problem, man.You see things that do not exist. In medical language, it is called hallucination. Usually,only psychotics hallucinate. Am i to believe you are becoming psychotic? Or may be you are on dope. Also, the kind of language you have used is something that only a third-rater would use. Am i to believe you have no class? Where are you from? If from Pakistan, my advice to you: grow up and learn from people like Bilal Ahmed how to interact. If you are from India, I am ashamed of you.

sridhar

Ref rsridhar #: 149

[You are sick. Get a doctor. I am a neonatologist in USA,so I cannot treat you.]

I must have touched a nerve when I mentioned Chu Ti Ah Medical College!

[Maybe you can get Shankar`s help.I believe he is a good psychiatrist.]

The gentleman you refer to has been caught in one too many contradictions. See the Vajpayee board.

[I have nothing more to say.]

The LCA uses an engine made by GE.

Reply #: 147

gymnosophist

You are sick. Get a doctor. I am a neonatologist in USA,so I cannot treat you. Maybe you can get Shankar`s help.I believe he is a good psychiatrist. I have nothing more to say. Please do not bother to reply.

sridhar

I really don`t want to rain on the IT parade but here is something you guys want to read. By the way, my company is sending back 3 IT guys back to India this week. I know of two companies which have gone bust and another one that has laid off 30 employees (30% of its workforce).

Subject: Indian IT workers: End of American Dream?

Experts say that the retrenching of Indian infotech workers in the US was long expected because Internet business solutions technology has vertiginously rocketed up three levels in the past six months; the Indian government is now faced with the problem of accommodating those coming back, says G Sandhya Rani

Hyderabad, March 6

Even as the US government hiked up the number of H-1B visas for information technology (IT) workers in the past two years from 60,000 to 150,000, there has been a gradual but steady disbanding of Indian labour from the IT sector in the US. It is in this light that the arbitrary inspection and harassment of about 300 Indian IT workers, mostly from Andhra Pradesh, in a Chicago firm two years ago, becomes significant - it was a warning shot of things to come. The workers were hauled up for not carrying their documents on their persons at the moment of the inspection

and detained by the police for almost 48 hours. Although the US government apologised later, the wounds haven`t quite healed.

According to the latest available statistics, about 44,152 Indian software engineers were ``benched`` in the US in November last year. The number shot up to 133,000 in December and 142,000 in January 2001. ``In a matter of two months, almost 60 per cent of Indian software workers were shown the door. A majority of them, about 80 per cent, are from Andhra Pradesh,`` says an official of the Hyderabad Software Exporters Association (HSEA).

``The Clinton administration had initiated the move for hiking the number of H-1B visas in 1999 and almost doubled it in 2000. Now it appears that the Bush regime is having second thoughts,`` said a member of the Indo-American Friendship

Association here.

According to many non-resident Indians (NRIs) who have returned to India in the past two months, Indians are no longer sought after IT workers. ``They prefer Europeans and Chinese to Indians now, as they have proficiency in more than

one computer language,`` says Suresh Vishnubotla, who returned from the US within 18 months. He had married a Guntur girl in November 2000 with hopes that he would settle down in Seattle permanently.

In the coming three months, about 6,000 IT workers are likely to return home, since their statutory annual work permits are unendorsed for another term.

So far, there is no sight of any renewal, say IT workers, who have begun to look for work in India.

IT consultants and bodyshoppers in Hyderabad are desperate now. The demand for H-IB visas is sharply falling in the state. They contend that the retrenchments in the US were long expected, largely because Internet business solutions technology moved up three levels in the past six months, making the personnel redundant.

This is bad news for Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu and his drive to make Hyderabad the IT training hub of India. Naidu`s ambitious plan to generate more than 100,000 software engineers each year to take over the digital services in the state is sure to suffer a setback. The fate of the 132 new colleges projected to start up in the state - about 132 in the next two years - is now in question.

Major job providers for Indians, like Sun Microsystems, Altavista, Bridge Solutions and a score of other dotcoms have already served retrenchment notices on about 12,400 Indian IT workers. ``Laws in the US are very simple and do

not give room for labor litigations,`` says Smita Raman, who returned to India last week, after working in an IT company in the Silicon valley for about three years.

Some of the major Indian training units have put up ``closed shop`` signs to terminate their overseas recruitment racket. Satyam has set up several units overseas and undertook shifting trained personnel within the continent, rather than from India, as it involved a lot of paperwork and also proved negative.

``I used to organise at least 2,000 tickets for the summer batches to US, but this year I have hardly 500 ticket holders,`` says MSR Murthy, a travel agent in Hyderabad.

Many training units have also stopped promising students placement in US. A number of IT training institutes in Hyderabad have also closed down due to the slump in the market for Indian IT workers. Of approximately 1,300 institutes, 600-odd have closed down and others are waiting for the termination of their franchises. Major e-training labels like APTECH, NIIT, WinTech and Peoplesoft have reduced the frequency of their courses and are likely to downsize their infrastructure by 40-60 percent cut in the next few months, says an industry source.

Although there is an evident improvement in infrastructure for IT-enabled services in Hyderabad, the US factor has led to a decline in the enthusiasm of most entrepreneurs. Many small software units with venture capital and angel funds want to get out of the business - they find the European and American markets increasingly wary of their products.

A top IT venture capital consultant remarked, ``A jinx has struck Andhra and India since January this year, particularly with regard to the IT sector.``

An extensive exploitation of the country`s infrastructure and bandwidth is the only workable hope for the IT sector now. ``If the government involves IT workers returning to the country in the digitisation of public services, there could be some relief,`` says J A Chowdhary, chairman of portalplayer, a Web service entrepreneur.

Ref rsridhar #: 144

[Re: # 142``I sent out an appeal for contributions to the Gujarat earthquake relief fund. I have received not one response from the 120+ Indian software engineers employed by the company I work for. So much for these idiots.``

Gymnosophist, that is because most Indians would give money not to individuals but to institutions. I gave my contributions to IDRF and UNICEF. I would never think of giving a check to an individual as I feel professional organizations alone can disburse the funds quickly and effectively to the needed people.]

You can attempt to whitewash these motherf * * *ers all you want but it won`t stick. I asked for contributions to be mailed to the company, the company would send the money to a US-based (IRS recognized) charity, and every individual would get a receipt from the charity so that they could deduct the contribution in their 1040s. I even pointed out that at 40% tax bracket, they would only be spending 60 cents for every dollar they contributed. No dice; not one penny.

[``It doesn`t matter whether you graduated from the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences or Magadh University``.

Are you kidding. Of course it matters. People who do their medical graduation from some godforsaken place in Bihar (most of these places are not recognised in US and U.K). I see many people at high places in US who have graduated from AIIMS. Of course a lot depends on how much effort an individual puts in but institutions matter a lot.]

No, it doesn`t matter. Just as the guy with a computer science degree from Ramiah College of Engineering gets the same salary as the guy from IIT, a graduate of Chu Ti Ah Medical College will get the same income as one from AIIMS or, as I said before, Harvard. You can put down Magadh University but I deliberately chose that, knowing exactly what Bihar is like. But so long as the college is on the list approved by WHO, they get to come to the US, take the exams (unlike IITans who get to ``give`` the exam), get a residency, and get a job as a full-fledged doctor. They do not charge lower rates just because they are Indians, like the IT folks do.

[A lot of what you have said including how much money you are making are not verifiable.]

I have said - twice, so far - that my billing rates will be questioned by idiots.

[You also seem to have something against the IITans.]

I don`t think they are God`s gift to the world, as they seem to think.

[May be you tried really hard to get into one of the IITs during your school days and could not get an admission (I am told it is tougher than getting into Harvard). May be you have had a bad experience with a single person from IIT and you are now making a lot of generalisations. My advice to you is - grow up.]

You can theorize all you want.

[Today India is not just designing but manufacturing everything from pins and needles to aircraft. Recent test flight of LCA is testimonial to that.]

Please tell me who manufactured the engine on the LCA. Also, tell me which factory in India produces the heads-up display that the LCA uses.

Sikorsky is producing a 19-passenger helicopter. Brazil produces the fuel tanks and China is producing the tailcone for this. India was not even considered a partner for this project. Tells you about your design prowess.

[How do you know that once India wakes up to competetion (as it is doing now,look at the latest budget) it cannot mass produce,like china or Japan.]

You can`t; right now China-made tires are being sold in India at half the price of locally made tires. You guys stand no chance. That is exactly why everybody is pinning his hopes on IT.

[Whenever i visit any big grocery store (like the Schnucks in St. Louis)i see products from all over the world: coffee from columbia, rice from Taiwan, bananas from brazil, Mexican mangoes and so on.]

And, I suppose, Indian software. I shall look for it at the local Fry`s.

[If you are from Pakistan,what are you doing in Pune.]

Spying on the Su-30s in the Pune air base.

[If from India, what does ``you guys`` mean?]

You guys with the chip on your shoulders.

This was published in Wall Street Journal ( interactive edition ) a few weeks ago. I am posting it here for the benefit of all.

December 22, 2000

Dow Jones Newswires

Pakistan Looks To IT To Jump-Start Flagging Economy

By DONNA FUSCALDO

Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

NEW YORK -- Faced with a labor shortage in the U.S., George Bogle did what many constrained employers do. He looked to the international markets for relief.

But the president and chief executive of Houston software company MegaMania Interactive didn`t tap the usual suspects like Ireland and India, famous for their abundant supply of inexpensive software developers. Instead the Texan bet his money on Pakistan, a country reeling from a military coup and facing a stagnant economy.

Ian Rowe had to get iMar.com up and running in breakneck speed but couldn`t afford the inflated outsourcing fees found in the U.S. So the entrepreneur turned to the Internet and found a little Web development company that had the talent and could meet the deadline at a much loftier price. Surprisingly, that company`s headquarters are in Pakistan.

Pakistan, a country that shares its border with bitter rival India, fundamentalist Afghanistan, and communist China, is known more for its nuclear-weapon proliferation, ongoing clashes with India and waning relations with the U.S. than for its technology prowess.

But the new military regime, which ousted the civilian rule in a bloodless coup in October of 1999 is aggressively trying to lure back foreign investment lost during the uprising. Its No. 1 hope in doing so is information technology.

This past year, Pakistan, under the rule of Chief Executive General Pervez Musharraf, instituted its first ever IT policy that includes generous tax breaks and financing arrangements for foreigners who set up shop in or outsource software development to the country.

The government has set up many policies to entice IT businesses. The policies include lifting duties on all computer hardware and equipment, providing a five-year tax holiday on software exports and foreign investments and offering software exporters a credit line with a low interest rate that doesn`t require collateral. The government also has committed 5 billion rupees or roughly $850 million to IT and plans to build seven universities concentrating solely on technology.

Software exports account for $60 to $70 million in revenue, but the government wants to boost that to $500 million in five years. And start-ups like MegaMania and iMar.com aren`t the only high-tech companies to turn to Pakistan. Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), Oracle Corp. (ORCL), Sun Microsystems Inc. (SUNW) and Motorola Inc. (MOT) all have a presence in the region, and International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) may build a manufacturing plant there, according to Farrakh Qayyum, Minister of Trade. Officials at IBM declined to comment on its future plans.

Why have so many high-tech companies ignored the perils of Pakistan and set up camp there? For Bogle, the Texas businessman, it was simple: to save money.

The cost of software development in Pakistan is about 15% of the cost in the United States, said Bogle, who at first was hesitant to disclose figures out of fear that others would jump on the Pakistan bandwagon.

Bogle`s MegaMania opened up its facilities in Pakistan just months after the October coup that ousted Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

``I got cautioned by a lot of people from friends on,`` said Bogle. ``But some things you do by faith and I had ultimate confidence in our man Norr that he wouldn`t have told me it was safe if it wasn`t,`` he said, referring to MegaMania`s chief technology officer Nooruddin Paracha, who suggested the company look at Pakistan. With a minimal investment, the benefits outweighed the risks, said Bogle, whose company is about to merge with Gulfnet Pakistan Ltd., a Pakistani software developer.

Foreign Investors Urged To Use Caution

But risks need to be considered. In addition to the clashes with India in the Kashmir region which have led to the nuclear weapon proliferation, Pakistan is currently ruled by a military government which has promised to hold elections and turn over control in 2002. So future IT policy is unclear. Investors in the region also have to contend with a lackluster economy.

``Pakistan`s economy is in very deep structural trouble,`` said Sumit Ganguly, professor of Asian Studies and Government at the University of Texas. ``Any where from 26% to 38% of the national budget gets devoted to national defense and another roughly 30% is debt servicing.``

Less than 10% of the population pay taxes and the country derives most of its revenue from agriculture and textile exports, he said.

And that`s not even factoring in corruption, noted Ganguly. A few years ago, a Swiss group ranked Pakistan as one of the most corrupt countries in the world, second only to Nigeria, he said.

But Pakistan`s minister of trade disagrees. He said the government is weeding out corruption. And with a growth rate of 3.5%, the economy is not in bad shape.

``The textile sector is doing well, we have an excellent wheat crop and the economy is not as bad as the media portrays it,`` Qayyum said.

As for the military handing over control in 2002, the current government is committed to the process of elections, Qayyum said.

Still Ganguly said foreign companies should be cautious. ``At this point (Pakistan`s IT policy) is all on paper. It remains to be seen how this will transform in any real meaningful action,`` he said.

At best Ganguly, who called Pakistan`s IT policy is a lot of ``smoke screens,`` said the country`s technology push could be compared with Malaysia`s initiatives a decade ago.

``Malaysia has been able to succeed reasonably well, but the country started out with a much greater base of wealth,`` he said.

Few emerging countries are making a dent in technology. ``A country needs extraordinary engineering skills,`` Qayyum said. ``It`s not like growing corn.``

Motorola, the handset maker, is already benefiting from Pakistan`s IT policy. According to Zouhair Khaliq, director of operations, Europe, Middle East and Africa, at Motorola, the military government has brought more stability and a more receptive regulatory environment. In the past, the country was less stable.

Take January 1995 for instance. The then-ruling government shut down Mobilink GSM, a cellular operator in Pakistan in which Motorola had a 75% stake, citing security reasons. By June of that year, all three cellular operators in Karachi, Pakistan`s largest city, were closed and a ban was imposed until January 1997. As a result, Motorola reduced its stake in Mobilink GSM to 30%, diluting its risk, Khaliq said.

Pakistan Makeover Focuses On Software Exports

But with the new government and its new policies, Mobilink is prospering. ``Mobilink has experienced the best growth in the past 12 months. The Ministry of IT and telecommunications (under the military government) approved a calling party pay policy last month and this is expected to encourage cellular growth as it has in other such markets,`` Khaliq said. Mobilink has grown its customer base three fold and is forecasting 300% growth for next year alone, he said.

Bahram Mohazzebi, Gulf and Eastern Mediterranean general manager at Microsoft, agreed that the technology sector in Pakistan is gaining momentum. He cited the government`s decision to remove duties from technology products. ``Pakistan is a huge market and we believe that it will be a major contributor to IT in the region,`` said Mohazzebi.

Microsoft set up shop in March and expects its presence to grow. Like many high-tech companies, Microsoft was lured by Pakistan`s large population of 132 million people and by cheap labor.

Pakistan is trying to move from being an exporter of cotton and textiles to an exporter of software, said Philip Oldenburg, associate director of the Southern Asia Institute at Columbia University. The country can emulate India, which has attracted IT outsourcing business, Oldenburg said.

An IT push in Pakistan is viable, but Oldenburg said he doesn`t think Pakistan will be able to thrive as much as India has. Pakistan and India share similar English education systems, but India`s higher education programs are more advanced, he said.

``India has an enormous pool of trained engineers,`` Ganguly said. ``Pakistan just doesn`t have that same kind of pool. They never made the same investment in engineering and education that India did in the early `60s.``

Pakistan`s Qayyum disagrees, however. Not only does he contend Pakistan offers better facilities than other countries, it also has an ample number of English-speaking citizens and has bandwidth connectivity rates that are lower than India`s, he said.

``We have a vision to be in the IT map of the world,`` he said. ``Pakistan has the sufficient infrastructure and incentives for IT to flourish as it does in other countries.``

-Donna Fuscaldo; Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-5253;

donna.fuscaldo@dowjones.com

India to capture 5% of the Global IT Services Market by 2004

http://www.thenewspapertoday.com/e-conomy/inside.phtml?NEWS_ID=5979

Re: # 142``I sent out an appeal for contributions to the Gujarat earthquake relief fund. I have received not one response from the 120+ Indian software engineers employed by the company I work for. So much for these idiots.``

Gymnosophist, that is because most Indians would give money not to individuals but to institutions. I gave my contributions to IDRF and UNICEF. I would never think of giving a check to an individual as I feel professional organizations alone can disburse the funds quickly and effectively to the needed people.

``It doesn`t matter whether you graduated from the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences or Magadh University``.

Are you kidding. Of course it matters. People who do their medical graduation from some godforsaken place in Bihar (most of these places are not recognised in US and U.K). I see many people at high places in US who have graduated from AIIMS. Of course a lot depends on how much effort an individual puts in but institutions matter a lot.

As far as your rest of the post about IT is concerned I leave to to people in that area to respond to you. A lot of what you have said including how much money you are making are not verifiable. You also seem to have something against the IITans. May be you tried really hard to get into one of the IITs during your school days and could not get an admission (I am told it is tougher than getting into Harvard). May be you have had a bad experience with a single person from IIT and you are now making a lot of generalisations. My advice to you is - grow up.

``You know, back in the 70s, these IIT wallahs all got their BTech`s, joined the IIMs for their MBAs, and used to work for Godrej selling soap. Because being a brand manager was a lucrative job. It just so happens that these fellows found the IT niche and they are there today. If tomorrow they can make more money selling kiddie porn, they would do it``.

Welcome to the real world. This is what happens everywhere. what makes you think these people who are more practical are doing the wrong thing. People will go where money and opportunies are. You have only confirmed what i have been telling in my last post.

``For all their vaunted degrees in engineering, the Indians can`t design, let alone mass produce, one single item without running to Japan,``

Today India is not just designing but manufacturing everything from pins and needles to aircraft. Recent test flight of LCA is testimonial to that. We designed Param Supercomputers when such a technology was denied by US. India`s economy is still not fully open to competition. Your post seem to suggest that Indians cannot mass produce. India has so far operated in a very closed enviornment,protected from ouside competetion. Also the bureaucracy and license raj has so far stifled industrial growth. How do you know that once India wakes up to competetion (as it is doing now,look at the latest budget) it cannot mass produce,like china or Japan.

``Most recently, you guys have been going to Korea. Just wait till you start importing stuff from Outer Mongolia``.

Gymnosophist, in a global economy, there is nothing wrong in importing stuff from any outside country,be it Outer Mongolia or Timbuktu if it is cheaper and of better quality. Whenever i visit any big grocery store (like the Schnucks in St. Louis)i see products from all over the world: coffee from columbia, rice from Taiwan, bananas from brazil, Mexican mangoes and so on. Does this mean US is not productive. In a really free market economy, consumers have the ultimate say,which is why i am happy Chinese goods have entered Indian market. This will only instil more competition among Indians. It is a question of improve or perish.

Finally, one question to you. You say ``most recently you guys have been going to Korea``. Which country are you from Gymnosophist. If you are from Pakistan,what are you doing in Pune. If from India, what does ``you guys`` mean?

rsridhar

Ref shammi #: 139

[Gymnosophist, what is your point, other than that you are extremely rude (imploring to Chowk that they should acquiesce in your immature demand to slander relatives of interactors) and arrogant (publishing an unverifiable hourly billing rate as evidence of your infallibilty)?]

You know, I did say: ``I can now imagine all of you idiots writing to say that I was showing off about my billing rates. Save your breath.`` The operative word was `idiot`, in case you didn`t catch it.

[Am I to understand that you did not graduate from there, and that is the basis for your tirade?]

Whether I graduated from IIT or even from elementary school is irrelevant. I am reminded of the famous debate in a meeting of the Operations Research Society of America meeting. A Stanford professor said that the aim of Stanford University is to graduate PhD candidates who will go on to occupy endowed chairs in Operations Research at major universities. To which the chairman of the OR department at Colorado School of Mines replied that the aim of Colorado School of Mines is to graduate students who would go on to endow chairs at major universities. That pretty much sums up my position.

[Your artificial distinction between hardware and software is further proof of the fact that you are willing to compartmentalize and pigeon-hole human creativity.]

Artificial distinction between hardware and software? If you wrote a program, where do you think it runs?

[And yes, Indians have excelled in all aspects of IT - software, hardware, systems integration, management consulting, entrepreneurship, venture capitalism.]

Mostly, Indians excel at being traders. That is exactly why you have 2000 Indian companies selling bodies at cheap rates to foreigners.

Ref rsridhar #: 140

[I am glad gymnosophist you are making good money in the land of opportunities. It is perhaps time you do something for your country (which IMO is going down the drain).]

Let me just tell you what these Indian IT professionals are doing for their motherland.

I sent out an appeal for contributions to the Gujarat earthquake relief fund. I have received not one response from the 120+ Indian software engineers employed by the company I work for. So much for these idiots.

[You just don`t seem to get it. It does not matter what the rates are being charged by Indian IT persons today.]

You are the one who is not getting it. You can go to a third-rate medical college in India, write the Visa Qualifying Exam or whatever it is called today, get a job in the US as a resident and qualify as a specialist, hang out your shingle and get $75 for an office visit. It doesn`t matter whether you graduated from the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences or Magadh University. Your rate is the same as a Harvard Medical School graduate. These useless idiots from IIT spend several semesters studying electrical engineering, probably take two courses in C and Unix, and choose to concentrate on the software side of the business because it is NOT intellectually challenging. On top of that, their rates are lower than what an American with a degree from the University of Arkansas is likely to earn as an employee of the Big 5 and the Arkansas guy is probably getting BJs to boot, if you go by Bill Clinton.

[What i am talking about is, tomorrow it is not going to be the same. A time will come when these very people will demand the same money as their American counterparts or better still the latter may have to do with less.]

And when the Indians do that, the Filipinos will be there to take away your jobs. Did you know that Arthur Andersen has had an IT development center in Manila for the last 10 years? There is really no magic to IT that makes it so suitable for the Indian brains, no matter what you want to believe. The real thing is that these IIT fellows have figured out that if they work with hardware, they generally don`t have the multiple releases that you have with software -- meaning you can put out buggy code with software and still keep your job whereas it is pretty tough to keep your job if the hardware fails to work.

[You have to visit India to know what i am talking.]

I am replying to you from Poona, the Software City. Don`t make assumptions about what I do or don`t do.

[I also found a number of good teaching institutes teaching them the skills at a fair price (NIIT,if you have heard about it,was there,in that remote part of India).]

A girl in Bombay told me she learnt Excel. I asked her if she could write a macro. She said no. All she could do was open up a spreadsheet, enter numbers and do simple arithmetic on the numbers. A 10-year old kid in the US would do that without cracking open the Excel manual. She is no dummy, what with a BCom and an MBA. Give me a break! I have heard enough about the NIITs and the Aptechs of India.

[Today there is a demand for these people and they are going where the demand is. Most of us are taken by surprise by this IT revolution in India.]

You know, back in the 70s, these IIT wallahs all got their BTech`s, joined the IIMs for their MBAs, and used to work for Godrej selling soap. Because being a brand manager was a lucrative job. It just so happens that these fellows found the IT niche and they are there today. If tomorrow they can make more money selling kiddie porn, they would do it.

[Chinese goods are flooding the Indian market and people are lapping it up as they are much cheaper and in many cases,better.]

That is because the Chinese don`t mind getting some grime under their fingernails making an industrial or consumer product. For all their vaunted degrees in engineering, the Indians can`t design, let alone mass produce, one single item without running to Japan, Europe or the US for technical know-how. Most recently, you guys have been going to Korea. Just wait till you start importing stuff from Outer Mongolia.

Examining Khosla`s crown

More on Mr. Khosla of Kleiner Perkins, and co-founder of Sun Microsystems:

http://www.redherring.com/vc/2001/0222/vc-mag-92-khosla022201.html

Re: # 138

I am glad gymnosophist you are making good money in the land of opportunities. It is perhaps time you do something for your country (which IMO is going down the drain). You just don`t seem to get it. It does not matter what the rates are being charged by Indian IT persons today. What i am talking about is, tomorrow it is not going to be the same. A time will come when these very people will demand the same money as their American counterparts or better still the latter may have to do with less. It is simple economics. India`s strength lies in its manpower. I believe it has found a way of harnessing this strength through this new-found mantra viz IT. You have to visit India to know what i am talking. Going to a small place called Tiruppattur (which probably is not even on the map) in a remote part of Tamil Nadu, i found a number of young minds enthusiastically learning IT. I also found a number of good teaching institutes teaching them the skills at a fair price (NIIT,if you have heard about it,was there,in that remote part of India). Today there is a demand for these people and they are going where the demand is. Most of us are taken by surprise by this IT revolution in India. While this may not be an answer to all the problems confronting India, here is a field where the learning skills very quickly get translated into earning potential.

Today,even China has no problems asking India`s help in the software sector. It is way ahead of India in many fields but we do not have any animosity. I think India would benifit immensely by having free trade with China. Of course it would be hard in the beginning. Chinese goods are flooding the Indian market and people are lapping it up as they are much cheaper and in many cases,better. I am certainly not shedding any tears over this. The point i am trying to make is when 2 former enemies can try to come together, what prevents Pakistan from forging a better trade relationship with India. One place to start would be the IT sector. NIIT, Infosys etc are private owned and would be, i am sure,happy to come to Pakistan. Is it pride then which prevents Pakistan government from seeking India`s help in the IT sector? For god`s sake don`t say it is Kashmir. At least i would not expect this from you.

rsridhar

Gymnosophist, what is your point, other than that you are extremely rude (imploring to Chowk that they should acquiesce in your immature demand to slander relatives of interactors) and arrogant (publishing an unverifiable hourly billing rate as evidence of your infallibilty)? You are a lone voice amongst many criticizing the IITs, and I for one, will not fall for your bait to glorify them any more than what I have already done. The evidence in the open literature is there for all to see. Am I to understand that you did not graduate from there, and that is the basis for your tirade? Your artificial distinction between hardware and software is further proof of the fact that you are willing to compartmentalize and pigeon-hole human creativity. And yes, Indians have excelled in all aspects of IT - software, hardware, systems integration, management consulting, entrepreneurship, venture capitalism.

Ref rsridhar #: 137

[What was that if not a juvenile tantrum?]

Statement of facts. You probably have difficulty understanding that.

[Of course the fact that Indian Software engineers and planners, with their undisputed talents, demand much less salary is what attracts giants like Cisco,IBM to come to India in the first place.]

Two Indian lawyers in Bombay hired by the (Indian) company I now work for charged standard American rates of $300 an hour (in Bombay, not in New York City) to work on a complex legal issue. That is selling intellectual talent at international rates.

Selling what goes for $160 an hour in the US for $30 an hour in India perhaps tells you that the intellectual talent you are selling in the IT field is not all that complex or is not worthy of any respect. Perhaps you are glad that India gets these crumbs rather than Pakistan but that doesn`t make you any better than the street urchins in Bombay who would run after a person if he were throwing 5-rupee coins into the streets.

Just as an aside, as an independent consultant last year, my billing rate was $275 an hour. That is in the IT field, so you know you can get horrendously good rates if you insist on it. On the other hand, if you simply have switched from vegetable oils to computer software (like Wipro did), you tend to price software services like commodity and ask for 70% margins as opposed to the 400% margins the Big 5 get.

By the way, do the Indian doctors in the US charge $15 for a simple office visit rather than $75? If they do, they would be doing the equivalent of what the Indian software engineers are doing. And to get these cheap rates, they actually had to go to an IIT? Don`t make me laugh.

(I can now imagine all of you idiots writing to say that I was showing off about my billing rates. Save your breath.)

Re: # 136,gymnosophist

What was that if not a juvenile tantrum?

I had talked in an earlier thread about ousourcing from India. Looks like it is already happening. It is only a beginning. Of course the fact that Indian Software engineers and planners, with their undisputed talents, demand much less salary is what attracts giants like Cisco,IBM to come to India in the first place. I am not a computer person but to me a projected export earning through IT of $ 50 billion by year 2008 is not bad at all. The last i heard, Pakistan was earning less than 100 million dollars annually through IT.

rsridhar