Posts from — January 2009

International Patent Filings: USA 53,521, China 6,089, India 766

According to the World Intellectual Property Organization, the U.S. continues to lead international patent filings by a large margin. However patents arising from developing countries have risen rapidly particularly from China. Among developing countries India falls behind Korea and China in such patent filings. But the numbers in the headline above don’t tell the whole story.

Keep in mind that the WIPO’s method does not take  the effects of offshoring and outsourcing. An American company may use its Indian facility or outsource to a vendor to develop the intellectual property, but then choose to file the international patent from the United States. This means that buried in the 53,521 American patents may be thousands where the bulk or all of the work was performed in Mumbai, Hyderabad, or Chennai. It also does not reflect the fact that much of the original work done in developing countries does not results in patents being filed and certainly not in international patents being filed.

As President Obama takes office, there is still gloom about the economy and about America’s role in the world. At least that is what Reuters reports today in a survey of 22,000 people in 22 countries, conducted for it by Ipsos. Respondents from 20 countries gave bad marks to the United States in foreign relations and other aspects. This is sobering news for most thinking Americans. But there is a silver lining even in this cloud.

And that is why The India Expert is talking about the report. People from just two countries view the United States favorably. One is Poland. The other is India.

Favorability toward the United States

In recent weeks, India has selected The Boeing Company (headquartered in Chicago) for a $2.1 billion defense order.  Last Fall the United States and India agreed to a landmark nuclear energy treaty which will enable American companies to sell nuclear power technology and fuel to India. Immediately after the terrorist attacks on Mumbai, U.S. Secretary of State Condi Rice made a supportive stop in New Delhi; and U.S. intelligence agencies shared crucial data with their Indian counterparts to establish the trail of the attackers. An Indian-American, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, of CNN fame, may be President Obama’s Surgeon General. The only two people being considered for a new position of Federal “Chief Technology Officer” are both of Indian origin.

The two largest  democracies in the world have never been this close in business, politics and culture. (Well… not since Columbus set out looking for India and not since American ice was exported to Calcutta in the nineteenth century). Ok, to be specific since President Nixon and Secretary Kissinger in the 1970′s launched an India unfriendly attitude.  The last two American Presidents have been pro-India in word and in deed. And it shows.

So here is more  good news in visual form. The question in this case was “Is the United States a good place to invest?”. And remember, this survey was conducted after the economic meltdown and after the US elections in November.

Is the US a good place to invest?

My takeaway from this? If you work with an American company, there is a way to convert these attitudes into goodwill, revenue and profit for your stakeholders. If you are in state, local or federal government, ask yourself how you can better engage with India (or China or Poland). The world has changed and the solutions for 2009 don’t look like the solutions for 1999 did.

(headline is tongue-in-cheek, friends)

As a child, I was always fascinated by elephants. Growing up in India,  we would see one or two in our alley where we had a giant peepul tree and a mahout would come by once or twice year to feed his animal.  When the Apollo Circus came to town, the elephants would pass by our street every day on the way to the Ganges river where the went to bathe and to frolic. Occasionally, the trainers would let my little brother and  roll our soccer ball in fron of the beasts who would play a form of elephant soccer if they were in a good mood.

As a California resident, I travel to India on business often and it’s always a thrill to see one of these magnificent animals on the roadside. When Hachette approached me to write “Doing Business in 21st Century India” I immediately seized upon the elephant metaphor to represent India and outlined the story of the Blind Men and the Elephant in the introduction. Since then Shashi Tharoor has picked up on my theme with his book (The Elephant and the Cellphone) and last month the Economist titled their India study, An Elephant not a Tiger.

Elephants are complex, confusing, smart, clever, emotional, voracious and can be very precise. They outlive tigers. Remember that when India frustrates you

The British movie  set in  Mumbai, SlumDog Millionaire, won four Golden Globe awards yesterday including Best Film and Best Director.

The music for  the movie was composed by the “Mozart of Madras”,  A.R. Rahman, who is now a Muslim but was born to Hindu parents and named A.S. Dileep Kumar until his conversion to Islam.  Rahman has been a top composer in Bollywood for almost two decades.  He was noticed internationally for the music of Oscar-nominated Lagaan in 2001 and for the Andrew Lloyd Weber musical, Bombay Dreams.

Unfortunately, the folks hosting the Globes mispronounced Rehman’s name, twice (two different ways). Better have the Oscar team practice their pronunciation.  And here is a Western interview of Rahman, shortly before he won the Globe.  (If you want to be an expert on India read carefully to note how the interviewer may be culturally insensitive.)

I was intrigued by The Telegraph’s characterization of SlumDog as  the first movie of the Obama era. At least Obama knows how to pronounce “Pakistan” correctly (the first American President in my memory not to say Pack-istan  but Pahk-istan).

Other trivia: The lead character in the movie was names Ram Mohammed Thomas (a combination of a hindu, muslim and christian names) by the author of the book. But the director preferred a muslim name for the star.

If you deal with India, you must recognize the enormous cultural importance to the game of cricket. Even though field hockey is the national sport, cricket governs the Indian DNA.  Cricket followed the British Empire to Australia, to Sri Lanka, to Pakistan and to Australia and New Zealand of course. Lately India’s team has been performing very well, particularly against the  U.K.

So here’s how the Empire strikes back: by learning Kabaddi. This ancient India team sport is like “tag” and played on a volleyball sized court.  Here is a report from the Indian media site IBN Live about the UK Army learning Kabaddi.

Now that the former British Steel (Corus) is owned  by an Indian company and even the car that the Queen rides (Land Rover) are owned by the former colony, there’s got to be some equity somewhere .