Business of Outsourcing

Infosys chairman N.R. Narayana Murthy on the Outsourcing backlash:

Let me explain that to you — when I get up in the morning I use my LG refrigerator, a South Korean product. You know we had our own refrigerator industry but it could not compete with these MNCs so it closed down, and jobs were lost. Then I drink a Coke or a Pepsi — we had our own soft drink industry but they closed down and jobs were lost. Then I use my Toyota — we had our own car industry, not very good but still, and it too had to close down and again jobs were lost. Then I come to my office and I use my Toshiba laptop or my Dell desktop — we too had our computer industry but it could not compete with the global giants and they had to close down — so you see again we lost jobs.

Now, I could take two views, the first view is we must keep these MNCs away as they cause loss of jobs — probably five million jobs. The second view is these MNCs have enhanced competition in India, they have enhanced customer satisfaction, as a result, 200 or 300 million Indians have benefited. I would like to believe that a paradigm which has benefited 300 million Indians is much better than not having that.

Nice stuff. Read the full interview here.