am-bush-ed

Who are India’s young entrepreneurs? To rephrase it, who according to President Bush are Indian entrepreneurs? It might seem tad flippant, but at the sidelines of Mr Bush’s visit to the ISB, an American consulate officer said that the criterion for selecting the 16 young business people for an informal meet with the American president was ‘experience’, apart from the obvious – age. It turns out that most have had some experience of United States of America - academic or business. A good number have at least part of their operations based in the US or have active business interests there. They represent a range of businesses from food processing, bio-tech, print to telecommunications and IT. Interestingly, the whole process of zeroing on these entrepreneurs started as much as three months back!

Given that, its hardly surprising to ask what this informal meeting was all about. Anjali Patel, a student of ISB (the only student on the panel of 16), said: “There wasn’t any prior briefing or an agenda per se about what we would ask him or discuss. He is such a down-to-earth man! At the outset he clearly stated to be a devout capitalist and was all for free market system. He wanted us to feel free to ask him anything we wanted”. One wonders, then, how come no one even mentioned Iraq. Then again, one must forget, we are talking about bi-lateral ties and therefore possible business opportunities and therefore political correctness is a must.

Nevertheless, the million dollar question – why ISB? Or for that matter, why Hyderabad? M Rammohan Rao, Dean ,ISB, quipped that the school has become a sort of a landmark, people who come to Hyderabad, at least those from the business world, usually pay a visit to ISB. Although, one of the entrepreneurs did say that, unlike Mumbai or Delhi, it is not a very active city and not very ‘political’ either. Well, as they say, it was decided by the Whitehouse!

On a more serious note, he felt that the city has made some amazing strides in terms of infrastructure, the industrial market, institutional support and has really good prospects. He was also sounded very positive about the exposure that this event would generate. Though ISB is well known, this would help in attracting faculty, students and may even pave the way for a lot of exchange programs and the like.

Coming back to the informal meet, what does the President think of outsourcing? “In the long run, they (the President and his men) do know that the 300 million odd middle class in India is huge market for the Americans. Outsourcing does raise issues of loss of employment, but in the bigger picture, it is inevitable and they are to gain a lot more than what they lose out on the outsourced work”, says V Madhavi, Founder and Chairperson, Prithvi Information Solutions Ltd.

Then there is the new consulate. Will he, won’t he? If not the entrepreneurs, here, most of the 20-somethings in the state would want to know this. Apparently, Mr Bush is said to have replied in a light-hearted manner, saying “now its up to Condoleeza Rice!”

All in all, after a perspiring wait for the whole entourage to leave, to catch the ‘lucky’ entrepreneurs, it turns out to be another notch up for the city of Hyderabad at least.