[icernet] India's Fresh Chance for Innovation

[Arul Selvan]

  At first glance, losing MIT's Asian Media Lab looks like a heavy blow. 
Chances are, however, that now India will make its own advances. India 
could still turn this bitter breakup into a victory. The incident has 
refocused the country's attention on R&D, and some Indians are hoping 
that it could encourage the establishment of a domestic version of Bell 
Labs. It has also brought public attention to the technological 
innovations done in small corners of India, like geographic-information 
mapping systems that could greatly ease the hard lives of rural Indians. 
What's clear is that with little or no support from multinationals, poor 
countries such as India will have to develop suitable new technologies 
and innovatively adapt existing ones to solve their own problems. That 
will put other nations on the path to progress, too. Same mission as 
Media Labs, but with a more home-grown flavor.

Source:
 http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2003/tc20030516_4396_tc078.htm