Procure IQ

Reading Scott Anthony’s Innovation Notes from India over on the HBR blogs, I can’t help but noticing that India is about to face the growing pains that North America went through during the information technology revolution of the last few decades. Consider Scott’s points one-by-one: India is a land of contrasts Every revolution, from the telephone through television to the PC made North America a land of contrasts between the haves and the have nots. The culture of entire communities, cities, and counties, literally changed overnight. Take silicon valley for example. It was a …

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I loathe saying it, but I think the US should import India’s bright entrepreneurs and their organizations to manage it’s healthcare and nutritional programs. In the US, 31% (or 1 out of 3) of people are obese (which is defined as 30 pounds or more above a healthy weight range) and 65% of people (or 2 out of 3) are either overweight (at least 10 pounds above a healthy weight range) or obese. Current projections put obesity at 40% (or 2 out of 5) within 5 years. And these statistics are almost as bad for children as …

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Despite what this article may imply. You can’t even truly learn India in 12 hard steps … in fact, if you weren’t born there, you might not be able to truly learn it at all. Just like anyone who wasn’t born there will always be gaijin in Japan, anyone who wasn’t born in India will always be videshi, even though she will always be welcomed if she respects her hosts and host country. In an effort to explain why, we’ll attempt to convey some of the hidden complexities behind the “12 easy steps”. …

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… but there’s also risk as well. In fact, I’d say the risk is as big as the opportunity presented in this Global Services article on the globalization of R&D and Product Development which claims that there is a tremendous opportunity for growth based on the fact that only 5% of current R&D spend is based on outsourced partnerships. While it is true that the average small to mid-sized software product company will continue to be faced with cost pressures and increased revenue expectations, that headcount in other economies like China, India, Poland, and Russia are …

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After reading first break all the rules in the special report on innovation in emerging markets in the April 17th edition of The Economist, I have to wonder if the charms of frugal innovation will be the salvation for supply chain leaders who have hit a brick wall in supply chain optimization. According to the article, the future lies in “reverse” or “constraint-based” innovation, which is being relabelled as “frugal” innovation. In frugal innovation, product companies take the needs of the poor consumer as a starting point and work backwards. Instead of adding ever more bells and …

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I have to say that I’m worried after reading grow, grow, grow in the special report on innovation and emerging markets in the April 17th edition of The Economist. Near the end of the article we are told, point blank, that the best companies in emerging markets treat “talent” as a supply chain that needs to be relentlessly managed, not an isolated problem that can be solved on a piecemeal basis and that firms invest heavily in creating “educational ecosystems”. While the first thing we do is slash the training budget every time money gets tight, companies in …

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Today’s post, which is partially based on materials from Dick Locke’s seminars on International Purchasing, is edited by Dick Locke, Sourcing Innovation contributor and President of Global Procurement Group.This post is going to examine some of the cultural differences that you may encounter (as an American or Canadian Sourcing / Procurement Professional) if you are doing business with India. We start by discussing each of the eight key cultural considerations outlined in our introductory post and highlight a few other points that you should be aware of. As per our initial post, this discussion is high-level and general …

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Share This on Linked In I enjoyed the recent short article on five keys to supply chain success in India in Industry Week. Not only was it not another article about China, but it tackled the issue of manufacturing supply chains in India — instead of the usual focus on service [...]

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Recently, I had the pleasure to have a couple of conversations with Ajit Singh, the Founder and Director of Algorhythm, a company in Pune, India that has significant expertise in Optimization and Supply Chain Modeling. The have their own optimization engine, a set of front-ends for different types of supply chain models that can [...]

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With all the negative attention that China has been getting lately, I only thought it fair to point out that before you think of jumping ship to one of its closest neighbors, India, it also has its share of problems. According to Speeding Up, but still not ahead in the Business Standard, despite [...]

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