Digital world

During the exam days in the college we used to play games like age of empires, fifa and counter strike by connecting on our LAN. Such a delightful was that experience, despite the fact that it ruined the scores in the subjects.It is just a minion picture of how computers and better connectivity are changing our lives.
When we compare the world few decades earlier and the present world we could lucidly see digitalization being pervasive in every aspect of our life. Earlier people used to communicate with each other via telephone or mails which took days or months. Today, any person can convey her/his message to the other person any where across the globe via emails within seconds or to the maximum, a few minutes. Social networking sites are providing us the virtual identities to communicate with each other. A surgeon in South Africa can succor a surgeon in India to perform a bypass surgery in India with the help of knowledge outsourcing technology. Internet has truncated the geographical barriers to do business.
Internet has revolutionized the way we do banking, shopping, communication, commuting and also politics. It has given us the power of efficacious and cheaper means of doing these imperative tasks.

Banking
Many banks like Goldman Sachs and Citibank have saved millions of dollars after digitalizing the working rather than on papers.Banks all over the globe are providing internet services to their customers such as account information ,e trading and certain scheme notifications. The better these services the more is their customer satisfaction. The ATM(Automatic teller machine) facility has helped instant cash availability at many important locations at any time to the account holders. The transaction via credit cards are also enabling people to remove the discomfort of carrying hard cash to buy anything. Blithely, this might definitely be a great anodyne for people in Zimbabwe who have to carry billions of their currency notes in order to buy basic amenities from the grocery, due to high inflation in their country.

Shopping
The Amazon and ebay are one of the biggest revenue generating companies through the e-commerce business.It provides the products to be delivered right at the house doors of the buyers. Many companies such as Dell,HP,Apple etc. sell their appurtenances online.It also let costumers discuss their problems with the software and hardware which helps the companies to correct themselves and provide better services.Walmart and Xerox experienced a significant increase in cost reduction and profits when they turned online to advertise and sell their products. The virtual marts are the next lucrative ventures for many retail behemoths.

Communication
Recently, in India 3G bid just touched Rs 8000 cr. and Indian government is expecting the revenues from 3G technology to easily surpass Rs 35000 cr. The telecommunication companies are investing huge monies for improving their connectivity across India, where only 1 % of the netizens use high speed broadband connections.3G technology might sound ephemeral when we consider the fact that many developed countries are using 4G technology such as Sweden. Some companies have already suggested Indian government to switch to 4G technology. Cisco has developed a technology of successfully transferring 1 gb/sec across PCs. It is thought to be a major breakthrough in the field of data transfer.
Also the success of e-choupals and SMS service to Indian farmers which help them to evade the transaction charges or usurpers such as zamindars or middle vendors shows the might of the digital technology in creating equality in the country. It provides them the ability to sell their crops at the market rates due to increased transparency of actual prices.
In some countries, police get the information from the victims with the help of IM(Instant Messaging) within seconds and they can reach them in a lesser time with GPS(Global Positioning System).A GPS enabled fire brigade can reach the accident prone area quickly to douse the fire.Also the doctors are well informed of the situation of their patients who are living in their homes.
Within the organization, digital world plays a major role in disseminating the information to the members to complete a particular task. Many social networking sites help the companies to recruit the right candidate and to get acknowledged with the employee via their status messages. It has helped the companies to become transparent and efficient. Distance learning programs are helping the students to gain knowledge by communicating with the professors abroad. E-videos are helping students to access the lectures of their missed classes.

Commuting
Boeing digitalized its offices and planes to save costs on papers and improve flying efficiencies. The luggage tracking software has paved way for the efficient and quicker delivery to the travelers. Many of the planes such as Boeing 747 and Boeing 777 fly with a smart automated system rather than categorical pilots maneuvering. Defense system also uses precise targeting software in their planes to kill their enemies while reducing casualties.

Law and Politics
Now the people are potent enough to spread their views across the internet media on websites such as Twitter,Facebook etc. The famous Iranian movement by the people was fuelled by the tweets on internet when the government banned the public media like news channels and newspapers which spread anti-government views. The heinous acts of government officials and securities on proletariats was demonstrated on youtube and other video sites.
Internet is becoming the most accessible way to communicate with the voters and many politicians are spreading their views to sell their candidature.Mr. Obama has millions of fans on facebook. He even did online canvassing to reach out to more people on the web.

A comparison between Indian and Chinese Economic strategies

The effect of financial meltdown is already felt globally.With America expecting 10% unemployment rate and many world class banks receiving bail-outs,the repercussions are felt globally.But how did India and China sustained in this situation where even the developed countries can't protect themselves?This question let me to delve into the details of the economic strategies of India and China.
China's GDP grew by 10.3% last quarter whereas India's GDP was just shy of 8% in the same period.There is no doubt that they are having a dominant place in the globalized economy.We know the factors like domestic market consumption and huge population which proved to be a blessing in disguise for India and China.There are other insights which are related to both these countries mentioned in "Billions Of Entrepreneurs by Tarun Khanna".

China has a system of hierarchical governance which helps it to make quick and exigent economic reforms whereas India follows a pluralism approach for economic reforms which is basically slow.But China faces a real problem.Since most of the domestic assets of Chinese companies are not publicly listed and financial analysts are not independent but state controlled the annual reports of the companies could not be trusted.Although, Caijing and few other media outlets have made little progress market information about business is still mostly partial.On the contrary, it is easier to get reliable information about a company in India due to the common law tradition of Indian legal system.
The property rights also discerns a different story for both the nations.Since most of the infrastructure is developed by Chinese public sector, individual rights are not taken into much consideration.Which is opposite to that in India as it is possessing institutional inefficiency due to free press,judicial processes and civil society which often lead to an impasse.And there is a link between property rights and economic growth as some scholars agree that more clearly defined are the former,the greater the possibility of the latter.Although the property rights in both the countries are ambiguous but it has not prevented China from building cities like Shanghai.On the other hand,in India a lot of time is wasted in overburdened court systems on the property issues which ultimately delays the process of development.

One lesson that China should learn from India is better equity market management.In India despite the periodic repression under British rule entrepreneurial class was always active.So, India could more easily rely on portfolio flows and flows of venture capital than on FDI.China, on the other hand doesn’t allow its equity markets to allocate domestic savings to domestic uses.Unlike India,where capital markets,however imperfectly,strive to serve the efficient firms,the Chinese government chose to list only firms whose objectives aligned with the government’s political goals.

The ascent of Infosys is largely credited to Narayan Murthy,whose career was involved working in France for a software company for three years,donating his assets to charity,and traveling through Europe back to India.An eventful sojourn in Bulgaria convinced him that pure socialism was not the answer to mankind’s problems and that redistribution of wealth, without first creating it,was a dead-end road.His success proves that Indian capitalism did not abandon all the ideals of a socialist.Whereas in China TCL rise is an example of considerable entrepreneurial hustle on the mainland.There have also been many acquisitions by both the nations private companies but these numbers were more for India.When the Indians have attempted big purchases-for example,The Indian petroleum company wanted to bid for a deal in Kazakhstan- the deal collapsed in intergovernment acrimony and a spat between the CEO of the state-run company and the petroleum minister.Such a public airing of differences,which is sometimes dysfunctional but can also result in meaningful discussion about feasibility and strategy,is unimaginable in China.But then there are too many companies like Microsoft which have lost millions,and wasted years of management time dealing with Chinese bureaucracy and the Chinese partners that had been imposed on them.

The percentage of the massive FDI pouring into China is as much as 80 percent,coming from Chinese living overseas.The world’s 57 million overseas Chinese, rule the world’s third most powerful economy.Indian economy is also succored by the remittances.Infact during the 1973 and 1979 oil crisis these remittances had cushioned India from external economic shock. India received $52 billion of remittances last year, according to the World Bank, making it the world’s largest recipient of money from migrant workers. China got $49 billion.

The fundamental difference between Chinese and Indian reforms is that the former focused on rural areas and the latter did not.Even though India’s former president,K.R. Narayanan,is a Dalit,caste remains not just symbolically important in village India but a defining factor in economic existence.But unlike India’s caste-based special interests,the Chinese government is not beholden to any special interests other than its own.For example the recently completed railway line to Lhasa,capital of Tibet, will likely bring economic development to the province,presumably an attempt to buy the allegiance of young Tibetians.

India is too short of oil but the Chinese trio of CNPC(China National Petroleum Corperation),CNOOC(China National Offshore Oil Corporation) and SinoPec outmaneuvers India.For example,Angola’s state-owned oil company Sonangoal blocked India’s state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Commision(ONGC)from buying Shell’s 50 percent stake in Sonangoal.This deal would have yielded about 5 million tones of crude oil daily for India from 2008.Angolan authorities did not appreciate the Shell’s direct deals with the Indain company.India, after all, offered only $200 million for developing railways,whereas Chinese were willing to ante up ten times as much for several projects in Angola.Hence,China got the deal.

Since both the countries are among the top countries in the economic growth rate.It is incumbent on the leaders of both the nations to cooperate in a way to maintain their own vested interests.It has been evident from the Cold war that how destructive the fight between the two powerful nations be.The ways in which this could be done is by maintaining healthier trade relationships,cultural exchanges,increasing MoUs between the Indian and Chinese universities,increasing subsidies for certain sectors in each others country.A good example of this could be the tie ups between hardware manufacturing companies in China and software manufacturing companies in India to compete in the world with better and economical PCs.