A team comprising members from Ministry of Science and Information & Communication Technology (MoSICT) The transformation of Bangalore from a dusty city to intellectual power house of India is and Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC) visited India to attend workshop on ‘Technical Briefing and demonstration on Data Center and Networks’ in Bangalore, India. As part of the team this was my second visit to Bangalore in the year 2009 after my first and last visit in the year 1999.



The transformation of Bangalore from a dusty city to intellectual power house of India is evident from the development activities and the attraction of the talent pool from all over India. The abundance of world class talent has given new meaning to the word ‘globalization’. According to Mr. Stephen Du Mont, Global Managing Director of Cisco Systems (India) Pvt. Ltd the globalization process that began with the invention of the sailing boat has matured to the current form leading to Globalization of the corporate brain: co-creation & talent. The path of today’s form of globalization has been represented in figure-1.

Figure 1: The Evolution of Globalization

This indicates that today the companies are investing overseas not just for manufacturing or R&D rather today the companies invest to enrich themselves through co-creation from the globalization of the corporate brain and talent. Hilary Clinton in a recent visit has that: ‘technical education in India is the best in the world. She said the US and India need to work together in the field to help bridge the gap between talent and opportunities’. (Source: India Today, 18th July 2009: http:// indiatoday.intoday.in/ index.hp?option= com_content&task = view§ioned = 4&issueid=108&id = 52409&Itemid=1). The high quality Indian technical education producing talented work pool has attracted international top companies to consider India for investment. For Bangladesh the Public and Private Universities are producing substantial numbers of graduates but unfortunately the quality aspect is not addressed properly. The Ministry of Education and the University Grant Commission will have to take special care to establish minimum quality measures for the education.



One of the top US IT company Cisco Systems has chosen Specialized Economic Zone (SEZ), Bangalore India for setting up their Eastern Headquarter to oversee business in Asia & Pacific Region spanning over 400 acres of land. The parameters for Cisco’s decision to relocate its office in compared to China, East Europe, Latin America reaffirms the availability of talent pool in attracting hi-tech industries.

Criteria San Jose, USA Bangalore, India China East Europe Latin America

Growing Talent Pool
Proximity to Innovation
Co-operative Government
Partner Ecosystem
Sizable Domestic Market
Active Investment Community

Table -1: All functions represented & co-located with a sustainable differentiator

IBM another renowned US IT company has established an IBM Labs at Embassy Golf Link Business Park, Bangalore. This is the only second such labs outside US and Japan. Mr. Subram Natarajan, Director, Systems Solutions Center told during the conversation with him that IBM Lab, Bangalore is rated as the best of all 11 IBM Labs. The reason for the establishment of this lab in Bangalore is because of the availability of the best talent in India rather than other incentives. The other incentives is according to him is the secondary considerations. IBM today employs over 80,000 personnel in India for operations and R&D.



Schneider Electric which has acquired the American Power Conversion Pvt Ltd popularly known as APC has a factory located in Bangalore at over 600 acres of land. The company produces uninterrupted power supplies and related equipments for data centers for the Asia Pacific Region including Japan. The net export from the factory is over US$1 billion. Mr. Shishir Agarwal, Director described the skills of Indian engineers and technician as the best. The establishment of APC factory has created jobs of various nature as well as equilibrium in various social strata of the society through diversity in employment categories.

Bangladesh has initiated a hi-tech park development initiative under Ministry of Science and Information & Communication Technology on 263 acres of land at Kaliakoir. In light of the observations above of the size and availability of the talent pool the hi-tech park implementation strategy may be reformulated. Universities in Bangladesh are producing enough graduates in the area of electrical and electronics engineering, mechanical engineering, physics and applied science. The factors affecting decisions for hi-tech industry to relocate in the context of the corporate brain: co-creation & talent, attracting company like APC will be interested in our Hi-Tech Park. This will also bring more opportunities to the wide spectrum of the society thereby preventing social discontentment.

Looking at The World Economy: Historical Statistics by PricewaterhouseCoopers/Michael Milken Institute, Chairman, Fastcures/Goldman Sachs shown above forecast of world’s top ten economies by the year 2050 gives a rosy picture for countries like Bangladesh provided steps can be taken to create a talented workforce. The United Nations forecast for population shown in figure below shows that Asia will have the most people.

For Bangladesh the population may grow to double the current size and impending calamities due to global warming. This will require larger job opportunities and balanced industrialization. The government needs to make strategic decisions for making the human resources and industrialization opportunity ready for the challenges and demands of the future. This will require major innovations to achieve the target to be middle income group status by Bangladesh. The innovation lifecycle followed in hi-tech industry is provided in the figure captioned Innovation Lifecycle. The industry and the government may use the innovation lifecycle for the development activities. The important aspect of the model is to be ready to offload any activities which may have lost its importance in the changed context to extract resources to reinvest in other area.

One other aspect in the development of the Bangalore which was observed is the sense of security. The travel on taxi cab and auto rickshaws at any time of the day is safer compared to Dhaka or any city of Bangladesh. One probable reason behind this could be employment opportunity for all strata of the society and balanced development in the industrial sector. The government can look into the core issues affecting industrial unrests and mugging in the city to attract the foreign investment in Hi-Tech Park. Though Mexico has many similar disadvantages like Bangladesh it has managed to develop industrial production through regional groupings and other corrective measures in the economy. The policies of Mexico can be of interest to the policymakers of Bangladesh to develop our own strategy to cope the challenges.

The whole exercise of establishing a Digital Bangladesh and achieve middle income country status will require greater understanding of the total issue and inter-ministerial cooperation. The establishment of industry means quality energy or electricity, talented, educated and trained workforce, industrial and personnel security in the society, smoother and hustle free entry and exit at airport and transport within the city and cleaner environment with standard civic amenities. Unless we take steps to ensure addressing the whole issues it will be difficult to implement a hi-tech park in isolation.
Criteria San Jose, USA Bangalore, India China East Europe Latin

America
Growing Talent Pool
Proximity to Innovation
Co-operative Government
Partner Ecosystem
Sizable Domestic Market
Active Investment Community

Table -1: All functions represented & co-located with a sustainable differentiator


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