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And so it starts. A decade or two after opening up the economy, Indian companies have started moving up the value chain, creating solutions to local problems in
by jkic47 15y ago
And so it starts. A decade or two after opening up the economy, Indian companies have started moving up the value chain, creating solutions to local problems instead of mindlessly building things designed elsewhere. Great to see this happen in my lifetime.
- keeptrying 15y agoTata seems to relish creating products for the bottom of the pyramid that no other corporation will touch. What they are doing reaffirms my faith in capitalism.
- jhpriestley 15y agoThe article mentions that these homes are targeted at the beneficiaries of the Indira Awaas Yojana - a government subsidy program. The article also mentions that other companies are going after the same market (with limited success).
- keeptrying 15y agoActually there were quite a few companies trying to make a sub $2000 car but only the tatas succeeded albeit at a slightly higher price. Yes there is a government subsidy for the lowest cost home but in India relying on the government keeping the same policy for more than 4 years is a little insane.
- jhpriestley 15y agoThe program has been around for 25 years, according to wikipedia.
- keeptrying 15y agoThat might be true but having to deal with the government is a painful path. And anyway there is a real risk that they can't actually engineer it so cheap like the nano. But as in the nano's case it'll help a whole bunch of people with low incomes. And since other companies have failed at this, I still think it's very entrepreneurial and ballsy to attack this problem.
- shriphani 15y agoI think this is more because of Ratan Tata's philanthropic nature. He is the best of the current breed of industrialists in the country though it is still sad that the richest Indians (Mittal might be an exception) inherited their V.C money (and got a lot of it actually).