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the title is clickbait. If we are looking at Asia then India is the more relevant competitor. With a huge Valley-returned entrepreneur community as well as bein

the title is clickbait. If we are looking at Asia then India is the more relevant competitor. With a huge Valley-returned entrepreneur community as well as being open for Silicon Valley to do business, I am betting that India will grow faster. Indeed Ola and Flipkart's senior management comes from Facebook and Google at this point ... and were forced to innovate faster and harder when Amazon and Uber entered India. This happens across all categories of startups. Sure China has a larger customer segment than India at this point, but that is not something that is going to continue for long. Oh and fundamental freedom and democratic rights go a long way to attract talent. Its not for nothing that talent chose to settle in the extremely vibrant and tolerant San Francisco area. Pretty much the exact same reason why Delhi and Bangalore drive most of the tech ecosystem in India. The biggest problem I see with India is lack of infrastructure at the same level as China. That I admit, is going to be a make or break.

jasim 11y ago
Valley-returned entrepreneur community doesn't mean anything in terms of innovation. App-powered logistics companies are no longer innovative; the wave was in the realization that commerce can be driven through smartphones and the internet, and that logistics can be massively improved by a combination of location-aware devices with abundant cheap labour from under-privileged population (not a value judgement). We are still a long way from doing ground-breaking scientific research. Innovative business models can only take us so far; fundamental progress has always been driven by the courage to think new thoughts, and that typically comes from the scientific community, not the business world.
- sandGorgon 11y ago
  That is where you are wrong. There is already fundamental work happening around vernacular linguistics, robotics (especially Grey Orange) and fintech. People misunderstand how much technology needs to be built to be able to reconcile something like cash on delivery. We are definitely far away from valley level innovation, but having people germinate the ecosystem with management styles and culture is extremely important. What is fundamentally broken is somewhere else - the investor ecosystem. Indian investors are young, barely out of college and are professional MBAs without a lot of experience in a startup. It is very hard to explain the value of technical debt, innovation etc...when we can chase copycat business models without innovation. It's been extremely hard finding bthe right culture fit in investors. Combine that with the fact that most entrepreneurs have not become billionaires in India...so you don't have that savvy, experienced angel investors with deep pockets (the Paul Grahams or the Peter Thiels of India). That is what needs fixing. China already has a couple of Jack Ma who are being the second wave of investors.

jasim 11y ago

Valley-returned entrepreneur community doesn't mean anything in terms of innovation. App-powered logistics companies are no longer innovative; the wave was in the realization that commerce can be driven through smartphones and the internet, and that logistics can be massively improved by a combination of location-aware devices with abundant cheap labour from under-privileged population (not a value judgement). We are still a long way from doing ground-breaking scientific research. Innovative business models can only take us so far; fundamental progress has always been driven by the courage to think new thoughts, and that typically comes from the scientific community, not the business world.

sandGorgon 11y ago
That is where you are wrong. There is already fundamental work happening around vernacular linguistics, robotics (especially Grey Orange) and fintech. People misunderstand how much technology needs to be built to be able to reconcile something like cash on delivery. We are definitely far away from valley level innovation, but having people germinate the ecosystem with management styles and culture is extremely important. What is fundamentally broken is somewhere else - the investor ecosystem. Indian investors are young, barely out of college and are professional MBAs without a lot of experience in a startup. It is very hard to explain the value of technical debt, innovation etc...when we can chase copycat business models without innovation. It's been extremely hard finding bthe right culture fit in investors. Combine that with the fact that most entrepreneurs have not become billionaires in India...so you don't have that savvy, experienced angel investors with deep pockets (the Paul Grahams or the Peter Thiels of India). That is what needs fixing. China already has a couple of Jack Ma who are being the second wave of investors.