India's IT industry is realigning towards domestic markets and #MakeInIndia companies - it is more aspirational to join Paytm, Ola, Zomato in India than to work for a US based outsourcer.
It is not even a competition anymore - I'm able to very easily get highly qualified Indians in Silicon Valley to move back and work on something cool in India.
This is the reason that nobody in India (incl the govt) gives a shit about the H1B rule changes in the US. The entire focus of the IT industry is shifting to move up the value chain. We are trying to build more Freshdesk in India and sell them to the world... Rather than body shopping.
It is going to be a time of massive upheaval as a lot of jobs will be lost - both as a consequence of the US pushback on visas as well as the change in strategic focus.
I'm Indian and I agree with you. Parent overdid it a little bit. People gives many shits about the H1B, and it isn't that easy to pull Indians back from the US.
Relatively easier than say ten years ago, but not at the level of bravado that parent exhibits.
This is not incorrect. YMMV obviously...but I stand by what I say.
However you misunderstood the reason - they are not coming because of me. They were coming back anyway because they want to work in India and build something here.
That was my point all along - I'm not uniquely positioned. It's happening all over.
I suggest you go and check the senior leadership on LinkedIn for the current stream of startups and large companies.
Even more - we have expats actually building successful and highly funded startups in India. Take a look at Zoomcar, Zestmoney and CreditMate. India is extremely startup friendly for foreigners - maybe not as friendly as the US, but definitely more than Europe, China, etc.
We are one of the world's largest consumer internet and smartphone market ... oh and with strong net neutrality guarantees. Everyone wants to tap into that. India is moving very differently now !
In the last week, I have had 2 conversations with CXO level leadership of companies in the Bay Area, who want to move back to India and build startups here. I get to do this a lot because I run one of the earliest YC funded companies in India (when it was "special" for YC to fund an Indian startup). I end up being the sounding board for a lot of CXO level talent moving back to India.
BTW - Indian startups form the second largest pool for YC applications now (after the US). Not sure what the funding stats are.
Yeah sure. You can get senior leadership anything, as long as you pay 5x the market standard pay. This is for companies who are a net negative in profit.
'Funding stats' don't mean anything in this case where they have to keep dumping money never to see any returns. This will hurt the long term ecosystem even for genuine start ups. As investors will largely look at India as some kind of a money sink, where rogue upper managements splurge by paying big money salaries to their own.
>>We are one of the world's largest consumer internet and smartphone market
Is this why Tata Docomo is shutting operations. Jio is in the debt of the tune 1,25,000 crores and Airtel is enduring losses just to survive?
>>oh and with strong net neutrality guarantees.
We all saw how 2G lobbying went.
>>Everyone wants to tap into that. India is moving very differently now !
Tap into what? Losses?
>>who want to move back to India...
Most of them hold US passports, and will bail at any hint of trouble. They will continue to work as long as their obscene compensations are sustained. They did the same during the 2008 crash. Moved to India, made big money and moved back to US the moment the honey was sweeter there.
Let them put their money where there mouth is, give up US passports, take up Indians passports and work here. Until then nothing much can be expected from this loot-and-scoot crowd.
That is still very much a small minority. For the average Indian programmer in the US, there's very little incentive to move back to India purely for professional prospects. Let's face it, I'd much rather code for Amazon in Seattle than Flipkart in Bangalore.
Other factors like the shitty visa situation (more and more people are chosing to move to Canada because of their permanent residency requirements), family ties and some more ethereal things like the pull of the motherland come into play. As an Indian in the US with maybe 70-80 people from my undergraduate class in the US, a grand total of one person went back to India to build a startup despite having a succesful career.
In your case it's one...in my case its a dozen. But then, I'm from IIT Bombay - we have always been nuts !
But even the "one" is more than what used to exist earlier. A US job used to be the epitome of what you could achieve in your career. It's no longer the case.
I wouldn't presume to comment on you...but do think about it. It's brilliant out here and we would love for you to come and do the same.
Not sure if you are from CS. But IIT Bombay CS, batch is like the going choice for the top AIR in JEE. Also the program and the prestige associated with it is life long aristocratic privilege. Things like funding, and other support from network and alumni get a whole lot easier.
But even with that much going on for you, I still wouldn't recommend returning for something like this. Not unless you had a US passport in hand.
And for most people who go to US don't have even anything close to this going on for them. So you do the math :)
>>it is more aspirational to join Paytm, Ola, Zomato in India than to work for a US based outsourcer.
Its hilarious you mention this. Those companies are in double digit billion $ debt, with no sight of returning even a single $ in profit back to their investors. Snapdeal recently bombed. Ola and Flipkart are next.
>>It is not even a competition anymore
Competition between whom. IT services firms haven't posted a loss making quarter in their history. And Product firms in India haven't posted a profit making in their history. Which is the real trash here?
>>I'm able to very easily get highly qualified Indians in Silicon Valley to move back and work on something cool in India.
They won't unless you beat Bay Area salaries and award stock options graciously. And that will happen only if you have massive VC backing. Also no one is going to quit their job in a first world country for loss.
>>This is the reason that nobody in India (incl the govt) gives a shit about the H1B rule changes in the US.
A lot of people do.
>>The entire focus of the IT industry is shifting to move up the value chain.
Increased salaries on VCs expense doesn't mean we are moving up the value chain.
>>We are trying to build more Freshdesk in India and sell them to the world... Rather than body shopping.
We were doing that before as well. The IT services firms you see today all started as product companies. In fact they were doing far more tech intensive work than the current breed of product companies will ever do. Most old IT services were early product companies that made banking sotware, embedded systems products and other stuff.
The start reality in India is without a VC pumping billions of $s and then ready to write off, all of it. You largely depend of debt(Why do you think real estate is so hard in India), or you have to bootstrap. If you bootstrap you need the financial discipline of a demon. You certainly can't pay Bay Area salaries to build MVP apps and write HTML/JS.
Most embedded systems start ups which are not in VC fashion catalogue pay peanuts even today.
The sad part of software engineer salaries in India is either US companies pay it, or VCs pay it. If you have to bootstrap, you have to pay atleast 5x less than what somebody like Flipkart pays today.
Debt is basically taking VC money. There is no way of paying it back, unless they go IPO. Paying it back through profits is a dead end here. People in India are just too price conscious, offer them gracious discounts and they will come to you. The day you stop they go where ever those discounts are. On the other hand they have tried playing the 'exclusive store' game. Its just not scalable, and whoever is try to sell eventually realizes they need a broader audience reach, and bailout immediately.
Now even if they have to go IPO they can't do it with their current financials. No public investor is going to put their money in a company whose first $15 - $20 billion in collection will go all to bail out VCs and remainder will go to subsidize customers's purchases.
Snapdeal is already toast. The real deal is you can't make losses forever, you have to make profits at some point and you have to make a lot of that to make up for early investors.
Ola and Uber are a totally gone case as far as India is concerned. Almost every family here owns scooters, and those who don't will take Uber and Ola as long as they beat auto rickshaw fares.
So here is the dilemma. Whether its Flipkart, Ola or Snapdeal. You are competing with road side hawkers and their profit margins. You can see where this is going.
Its just that India's purchasing power among the common middle class masses has to go up, and they need to stop thinking in terms of 'price first' approach. That won't happen anytime soon.
FYI all these new high tech "Made In India" companies are backed by Chinese investors. PayTM and Zomato are largely backed by Alibaba, Ola backed by Tencent,
India's IT industry is realigning towards domestic markets and #MakeInIndia companies - it is more aspirational to join Paytm, Ola, Zomato in India than to work for a US based outsourcer.
It is not even a competition anymore - I'm able to very easily get highly qualified Indians in Silicon Valley to move back and work on something cool in India.
This is the reason that nobody in India (incl the govt) gives a shit about the H1B rule changes in the US. The entire focus of the IT industry is shifting to move up the value chain. We are trying to build more Freshdesk in India and sell them to the world... Rather than body shopping.
It is going to be a time of massive upheaval as a lot of jobs will be lost - both as a consequence of the US pushback on visas as well as the change in strategic focus.