Every time there is an India - Pakistan standoff, my mind goes back to that evening in Dubai.

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How many entrepreneurs are there in India?

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One of my meetings recently was with a young lady, who had just graduated from the arts stream of one of Delhi's premier colleges. And amongst the many things we discussed was of course the chances that graduates from her class would choose the path of entrepreneurship.

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This year, some where close to six million paid visitors will visit that monument of love, the Taj Mahal. About a kilometer away from the entrance to the Taj, they will queue up for their entry tickets. Entry to the Taj costs Rs. 20 for Indians and Rs. 750 for foreigners and you get a fairly good entry ticket, one of the best for a monument in India.

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In the nineties and early twenty hundreds, it was common for corporate strategist to consider options of "killing the competition". I remember sitting in, in the strategy meeting of one of India's leading business houses. On the first day no recording or note taking was allowed, So I am repeating from memory . The Chairman, a leading light of his industry ended his opening session by exhorting his senior-most team to "kill off the competition". Fast forward to today, the company in question has multiplied its turnover and profits many times and is still the leading light in its industry. But what about the competition? Have they been killed off? There are more competitors today than there were then. And many of them are in a similar position to the company in question - their turnover and profits too have improved manifold.

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The Indian railways has often been called the life line of the country. Running across the length and breadth of the country, it is one of the largest rail networks in the world and transports over 6 billion passengers and over 350 million tonnes of freight. Here are seven websites that cover (almost) the entire  gamut of railway operations that you and me will ever get involved in.

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This is a continuation of my earlier post  - The Dubai debt repayment crisis. What is it? How will it play out? This post looks specifically at how the crisis will affect the Indian economy and Indian companies.
 
The Government of India as well as the Reserve Bank have stated that there  is nothing to worry. Major banks have followed suit, quantifying their exposure in Dubai and major real estate firms have followed suit. Does that mean that there is nothing to worry? While in a macro economic sense, this may be correct, at a more on the ground level, the truth is far worse; there are very real reasons to worry. Let us understand the sectors that will be negatively impacted in India and this is key - IF, repeat IF the crisis becomes bigger and goes beyond Dubai World and affects the region at large.

1. Foreign inward remittances - down

The gulf region is the major contributors to foreign inward remittances into India. This is not corporate income or FDI (Foreign Direct Investment). The bulk of these inward remittances are the aggregation of monies Indians working in the region keep sending home, month after month. The last couple of years have been hard on these people, given the general economic situation. Any region specific monetary crisis  could well end up as the straw that broke the camel's back. 

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By now a lot of internet bandwidth has been consumed by discussions about the Dubai debt repayment crisis and its possible impact. The timing of the announcement was such that immediate discussions could be kept to the minimum - The Arab world was in the midst of Eid, the United States was closed for thanks giving and it was  one day to the weekend in the rest of the world. But given the 24 x 7 x 365 nature of today's news and business cycles, there is only so much of discussion you can hope to keep down.

So, government after government and company after company has gone on record to assure one and all that they will not be affected or that their exposure will be limited. As i write this, the Royal bank of Scotland and HSBC are supposed to have the maximum exposure to Dubai's debt.

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Many, including yours truly have written reams about the advantages of using software as a service instead of software installed just for you, at your premises. But none have dwelt upon the problems you can face as you go along. And rest assured, there are enough problems with SAAS.

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What is customer support? Customer support is something that kicks in when customers are in trouble or otherwise need help with your product or service. If everything works well, there would be no need for customer support!

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