Over the last two decades, India has become a global hub for software development and offshoring of back office services, as we call it, and what we were interested in finding out was that because of this huge industry that has started over the last two decades in India, offshoring software development and back office services, there's been a flight of white collar jobs from the developed world to India. When this is combined with the loss of manufacturing jobs to China, it has, you know, led to considerable angst amongst the Western populations.
過去20餘年來,印度成為 全球軟體發展中心 提供所謂的企業辦公後勤作業服務 我們想知道 由於這個龐大新型事業 過去20餘年間於印度發展 軟體開發與企業後勤服務 外包 白領階級工作紛紛外移 從已開發世界移轉到印度 同時製造業的工作機會流失移轉到中國 造成西方世界中許多人民 感到不安
In fact, if you look at polls, they show a declining trend for support for free trade in the West. Now, the Western elites, however, have said this fear is misplaced. For example, if you have read — I suspect many of you have done so — read the book by Thomas Friedman called "The World Is Flat," he said, basically, in his book that, you know, this fear for free trade is wrong because it assumes, it's based on a mistaken assumption that everything that can be invented has been invented. In fact, he says, it's innovation that will keep the West ahead of the developing world, with the more sophisticated, innovative tasks being done in the developed world, and the less sophisticated, shall we say, drudge work being done in the developing world.
其實,只要看一下民調 西方對自由貿易的支持在消退中 然而,西方的菁英們,現在說了 這股恐懼沒道理 舉例來說,假如你讀過 - 我估計你們應該都讀過 湯馬士 佛立德曼 的書 "地球是平的",他說,基本上 畏懼自由貿易這股情緒不對 因為這來自一個錯誤的假設 - 以為人類能發明的東西都已經發明光了 但他說,事實上,創新是西方藉以 持續領先開發中國家的法寶 把複雜的,創新的工作 留在已開發世界,把較不複雜的 這麼說吧,很無聊的工作 送到開發中國家去
Now, what we were trying to understand was, is this true? Could India become a source, or a global hub, of innovation, just like it's become a global hub for back office services and software development? And for the last four years, my coauthor Phanish Puranam and I spent investigating this topic.
我們現在要搞清楚 這是真的嗎? 印度有沒有可能成為創新的源頭 創新的世界中心 就好像企業後勤,軟體開發 一樣的世界中心 法里胥 普拉南 在過去四年間和我一起 研究這個主題
Initially, or, you know, as people would say, you know, in fact the more aggressive people who are supporting the Western innovative model, say, "Where are the Indian Googles, iPods and Viagras, if the Indians are so bloody smart?" (Laughter)
一開始,人們說 那些支持西方創新模型的人 也是比較激進的那些傢伙 說了 「假如印度人真有這麼聰明, 那印度版的Google, iPod 與威爾剛在哪兒?」 (笑聲)
So initially, when we started our research, we went and met several executives, and we asked them, "What do you think? Will India go from being a favored destination for software services and back office services to a destination for innovation?" They laughed. They dismissed us. They said, "You know what? Indians don't do innovation." The more polite ones said, "Well, you know, Indians make good software programmers and accountants, but they can't do the creative stuff."
所以呢,在我們研究初期 我們訪問一些公司的高層人員,我們問他們: 印度有機會從一個軟體開發,企業後勤服務移入國 變成一個創新的移入國嗎? 你認為呢? 他們大笑,看都不看我們一眼 他們說:"別鬧了,印度人不搞創新" 比較客氣的這麼說:"這個啊,你也知道的,印度人 是很好的程式設計人,也是好的會計師 但他們的創新能力還不到位"
Sometimes, it took a more, took a veneer of sophistication, and people said, "You know, it's nothing to do with Indians. It's really the rule-based, regimented education system in India that is responsible for killing all creativity." They said, instead, if you want to see real creativity, go to Silicon Valley, and look at companies like Google, Microsoft, Intel.
有時,他們更委婉,說的更含蓄 "你了解的,這和印度人本身無關 只是印度的按規章行事,定型的教育體系 造成了印度人不能發揮創意" 他們說,要搞創新,得看真的創新是什麼 你去矽谷,看看Google, 微軟,英特爾 這些公司是怎麼做的
So we started examining the R&D and innovation labs of Silicon Valley. Well, interestingly, what you find there is, usually you are introduced to the head of the innovation lab or the R&D center as they may call it, and more often than not, it's an Indian. (Laughter)
所以,我們就去研究矽谷公司 的研發與創新實驗室 有趣的是,當他們向我們介紹 各創意實驗室中心,或所謂的研發中心 的負責人時 他們多半都是印度人 (笑聲)
So I immediately said, "Well, but you could not have been educated in India, right? You must have gotten your education here." It turned out, in every single case, they came out of the Indian educational system. So we realized that maybe we had the wrong question, and the right question is, really, can Indians based out of India do innovative work?
我們馬上就問了: "你該不會是在印度受教育的吧? 你一定是在這裡受教育的" 結果呢,每一個 都是出身於印度的教育體系 所以我們猜我們一定問錯問題了 真的問題是,其實,印度人 在印度能不能做有關創意的工作?
So off we went to India. We made, I think, about a dozen trips to Bangalore, Mumbai, Gurgaon, Delhi, Hyderabad, you name it, to examine what is the level of corporate innovation in these cities. And what we found was, as we progressed in our research, was, that we were asking really the wrong question. When you ask, "Where are the Indian Googles, iPods and Viagras?" you are taking a particular perspective on innovation, which is innovation for end users, visible innovation.
我們來到印度,去了班加羅爾, 孟買,格爾高,德理,海德拉巴德等你想的到的城市 至少12次,去調查這些城市裡 各大公司的創新水準 我們在研究中發現 我們真的問錯問題了 假如你問:"印度的Google在哪? 印度有iPod嗎?有威爾剛嗎?" 我們只是碰觸到了 創新的一個面向,是為消費者而產生的創新 是看的到的創新
Instead, innovation, if you remember, some of you may have read the famous economist Schumpeter, he said, "Innovation is novelty in how value is created and distributed." It could be new products and services, but it could also be new ways of producing products. It could also be novel ways of organizing firms and industries.
反而呢,假如你用知名經濟學家,有人或許看過他的相關報導, 熊彼得的看法 他說:"創新就是價值創造及分享 的新方式" 可以是新產品,新的服務 但也可以是生產產品的新方法 也可以是公司結構,行業組合的新方式
Once you take this, there's no reason to restrict innovation, the beneficiaries of innovation, just to end users. When you take this broader conceptualization of innovation, what we found was, India is well represented in innovation, but the innovation that is being done in India is of a form we did not anticipate, and what we did was we called it "invisible innovation." And specifically, there are four types of invisible innovation that are coming out of India.
一旦採取這觀點,就沒有理由把創新的受益者 侷限於終端消費者身上。 一旦以這種較寬廣的視角來看創新 我們發現,印度的創新其實多著呢 但在印度的創新 是一種我們不曾預期的創新形式,所以我們 把這些創新稱為:"隱形的創新" 更詳細的說,我們把來自印度的創新 分成四類型隱形創新
The first type of invisible innovation out of India is what we call innovation for business customers, which is led by the multinational corporations, which have -- in the last two decades, there have been 750 R&D centers set up in India by multinational companies employing more than 400,000 professionals. Now, when you consider the fact that, historically, the R&D center of a multinational company was always in the headquarters, or in the country of origin of that multinational company, to have 750 R&D centers of multinational corporations in India is truly a remarkable figure.
第一種來自印度的隱形創新 是為公司客戶的創新 由跨國公司引導 這些跨國公司在過去二十年間 在印度各地設立了750個研發中心 雇用了40餘萬的專業人員 把跨國公司在過去一般只把 研究中心設在公司總部所在國, 或是設在他們的母國這件事列入考慮 那麼印度今天能有750個 跨國公司的研究中心 這真是個不可思議的數字
When we went and talked to the people in those innovation centers and asked them what are they working on, they said, "We are working on global products." They were not working on localizing global products for India, which is the usual role of a local R&D. They were working on truly global products, and companies like Microsoft, Google, AstraZeneca, General Electric, Philips, have already answered in the affirmative the question that from their Bangalore and Hyderabad R&D centers they are able to produce products and services for the world. But of course, as an end user, you don't see that, because you only see the name of the company, not where it was developed.
當我們問那些工作於 創意中心的人們,問他們做些什麼 他們說;"我們正在研發供全球使用的產品" 他們不是生產一個全球產品的印度版 這通常是本地公司的研發中心的任務 他們真的在研發全球級產品 像是微軟,谷歌,AstraZeneca, 奇異(GE) 費立普等跨國公司,已經用他們在 班加羅爾,海德拉巴德等地的研發中心,正面回應 這些研發中心的確有生產提供 全球產品及服務的能力 當然,身為終端消費者,我們看不到這些 我們只看到公司的名字 而沒看到產品是在哪裡開發的
The other thing we were told then was, "Yes, but, you know, the kind of work that is coming out of the Indian R&D center cannot be compared to the kind of work that is coming out of the U.S. R&D centers." So my coauthor Phanish Puranam, who happens to be one of the smartest people I know, said he's going to do a study. What he did was he looked at those companies that had an R&D center in USA and in India, and then he looked at a patent that was filed out of the U.S. and a similar patent filed out of the same company's subsidiary in India, so he's now comparing the patents of R&D centers in the U.S. with R&D centers in India of the same company to find out what is the quality of the patents filed out of the Indian centers and how do they compare with the quality of the patents filed out of the U.S. centers?
他們那時還說:"印度的確有創新, 但在印度研發中心所做出的產品 和美國研發中心所做出的產品 不能相提並論。" 我的合作者,也剛巧是我認識的最聰明的人之一 法里胥 普拉南,聽了後就說 他要研究這句話是否正確 他把那些在美國和在印度 都有研發中心的公司找出來 然後檢視同間公司美國子公司 與印度子公司所申請的 類似專利 他比較美國的研發中心 與在印度的研發中心 各別申請的專利 比較這些專利 品質是否有高下之分
Interestingly, what he finds is — and by the way, the way we look at the quality of a patent is what we call forward citations: How many times does a future patent reference the older patent? — he finds something very interesting. What we find is that the data says that the number of forward citations of a patent filed out of a U.S. R&D subsidiary is identical to the number of forward citations of a patent filed by an Indian subsidiary of the same company within that company. So within the company, there's no difference in the forward citation rates of their Indian subsidiaries versus their U.S. subsidiaries. So that's the first kind of invisible innovation coming out of India.
有趣的是,他發現 -- 對了,我們比較專利品質 用的是'後續引用指標': 一件專利 被其後其他專利引用的次數是多少 -- 他有些發現挺有意思 我們發現根據資料顯示 美國公司的專利後續引用指標 和同公司印度子公司的專利申請的後續引用指標 完全一樣 就同一間公司的美/印子公司來看 所以,在同一間公司 印度子公司的專利後續引用指標 和美國子公司一樣 這就是產生於印度的第一種隱形的創新
The second kind of invisible innovation coming out of India is what we call outsourcing innovation to Indian companies, where many companies today are contracting Indian companies to do a major part of their product development work for their global products which are going to be sold to the entire world. For example, in the pharma industry, a lot of the molecules are being developed, but you see a major part of that work is being sent to India. For example, XCL Technologies, they developed two of the mission critical systems for the new Boeing 787 Dreamliner, one to avoid collisions in the sky, and another to allow landing in zero visibility. But of course, when you climb onto the Boeing 787, you are not going to know that this is invisible innovation out of India.
第二項源自於印度的隱形的創新 我們稱為"把創新外包到印度公司" 今天有許多公司把他們全球產品的開發 主要的工作外包到印度公司 這些產品 都將銷售於全球 舉例來說,製藥產業開發許多的分子 但主要的開發工作 全被送到印度 例如 XCL Technologies 為波音787夢幻機開發的兩項 重要的操控系統 一個是避免空中碰撞的系統 一個是在能見度為零下能安全讓飛機降落的自控系統 當然囉,當你爬上一架波音787飛機 你不會知道這是來自印度的 隱形的創新
The third kind of invisible innovation coming out of India is what we call process innovations, because of an injection of intelligence by Indian firms. Process innovation is different from product innovation. It's about how do you create a new product or develop a new product or manufacture a new product, but not a new product itself?
第三項源自印度的隱形的創新 稱為過程的創新 來自於印度的智慧,注入了這些創新之中 過程的創新和產品的創新不同 過程的創新處理有關 如何創造新產品, 開發新產品 和 生產新產品 但不處理新產品本身
Only in India do millions of young people dream of working in a call center. What happens — You know, it's a dead end job in the West, what high school dropouts do. What happens when you put hundreds of thousands of smart, young, ambitious kids on a call center job? Very quickly, they get bored, and they start innovating, and they start telling the boss how to do this job better, and out of this process innovation comes product innovations, which are then marketed around the world.
只有在印度,有數以百萬計的年輕人 夢想在電話客服中心工作 會發生什麼事呢? -- 你也知道,在西方 這可是高中沒畢業的人做的沒前途的工作 當你把數十萬聰明 年輕,充滿野心的小伙子 放在客服電話中心工作,會發生什麼事? 他們很快就覺得無聊,然後他們就開始創新 他們告訴他們的老闆工作怎樣可以做的更好 就是這種過程的創新,也帶動了產品創新 這些產品成為行銷全球的產品
For example, 24/7 Customer, traditional call center company, used to be a traditional call center company. Today they're developing analytical tools to do predictive modeling so that before you pick up the phone, you can guess or predict what this phone call is about. It's because of an injection of intelligence into a process which was considered dead for a long time in the West.
舉例來說,24/7 客服公司 過去是個很傳統的 經營電話客服中心的公司。今天,他們開發出 分析工具處理預測型模, 在客服人員接起電話前 就能猜出或預測出這通來電的目的 因為這個過程有來自印度的智慧 在西方,早已不存在這樣的智慧了
And the last kind of innovation, invisible innovation coming out of India is what we call management innovation. It's not a new product or a new process but a new way to organize work, and the most significant management innovation to come out of India, invented by the Indian offshoring industry is what we call the global delivery model. What the global delivery model allows is, it allows you to take previously geographically core-located tasks, break them up into parts, send them around the world where the expertise and the cost structure exists, and then specify the means for reintegrating them. Without that, you could not have any of the other invisible innovations today.
最後的一種創新,來自 印度的隱形創新,是’管理創新’ 不是新產品,也不是新過程 而是組織工作的新方式 而來自印度外包行業所發明的 最重要的管理創新 是”全球服務” 全球服務讓你能 把以前必須於全球各地的核心工作 打散,把打散後分離出來的工作送到世界 各地有相關專業及成本結構的地方 然後指定重新組織這些工作的方式 沒有這項創新,就不可能 有今天這些其他的隱形創新
So, what I'm trying to say is, what we are finding in our research is, that if products for end users is the visible tip of the innovation iceberg, India is well represented in the invisible, large, submerged portion of the innovation iceberg.
所以,我要說的是,我們的研究發現 假如把消費者產品看成 是創新冰山的一角 印度在那看不到的,大規模的 沈潛於水面下的創新冰山基座,佔有主要角色
Now, this has, of course, some implications, and so we developed three implications of this research. The first is what we called sinking skill ladder, and now I'm going to go back to where I started my conversation with you, which was about the flight of jobs. Now, of course, when we first, as a multinational company, decide to outsource jobs to India in the R&D, what we are going to do is we are going to outsource the bottom rung of the ladder to India, the least sophisticated jobs, just like Tom Friedman would predict.
當然,這也有些不很明顯的現象 我們就這項研究整理出三個現象 第一個,我們叫”下沈的技能階梯” 現在我要回到我開始演講時 提到的工作流失 當一個跨國公司決定 把研發工作外包到印度 他們把研發部門最底層 的工作,最不複雜的工作,送到印度。 這也如 佛立德曼(地球是平的一書作者)所預測發生的事
Now, what happens is, when you outsource the bottom rung of the ladder to India for innovation and for R&D work, at some stage in the very near future you are going to have to confront a problem, which is where does the next step of the ladder people come from within your company? So you have two choices then: Either you bring the people from India into the developed world to take positions in the next step of the ladder — immigration — or you say, there's so many people in the bottom step of the ladder waiting to take the next position in India, why don't we move the next step to India?
然後呢,你已經把底層工作送到印度 讓他們做研發創新的工作 很快很快的 你面臨一個問題 就是,從公司內要找比最底層高一階的 工作人員,該怎麼找? 你有兩個選擇: 要不,你就把印度低階員工引進到開發國家 讓他們往上走一步 升上高一階的職位 ──移民── 或者,你想,既然在印度有這麼多 的最低階人員等著要往上升一階 那何不把這比最低一階高一階的工作送到印度去?
What we are trying to say is that once you outsource the bottom end of the ladder, you -- it's a self-perpetuating act, because of the sinking skill ladder, and the sinking skill ladder is simply the point that you can't be an investment banker without having been an analyst once. You can't be a professor without having been a student. You can't be a consultant without having been a research associate. So, if you outsource the least sophisticated jobs, at some stage, the next step of the ladder has to follow.
我們要說的是 一旦你把最底層的工作外包了 這是個自我存續的行為,正因下沈的技能階梯現象而來 而這個下沈的技能階梯簡單說就是 要成為一個投資銀行家 你得先做過分析師才行 你沒當過學生就不可能成為教授 你沒做過研究助理,就不會成為顧問 所以,一旦你外包了最簡單的工作 下一段更高階的工作也就跟著外包(流失)了
The second thing we bring up is what we call the browning of the TMT, the top management teams. If the R&D talent is going to be based out of India and China, and the largest growth markets are going to be based out of India and China, you have to confront the problem that your top management of the future is going to have to come out of India and China, because that's where the product leadership is, that's where the important market leadership is.
研究發現的第二個現象 是高階管理人員在地化(黃皮膚化) 假如研發人員將奠基於印度 及中國,而世界上最大的成長市場 也奠基於印度和中國 你會面臨 未來的高階管理階層 也必須奠基於印度和中國 這個問題 因為相關產品的生產領導階層都在印度及中國 市場上的領導階層也在那兒
Right? And the last thing we point out in this slide, which is, you know, that to this story, there's one caveat. India has the youngest growing population in the world. This demographic dividend is incredible, but paradoxically, there's also the mirage of mighty labor pools. Indian institutes and educational system, with a few exceptions, are incapable of producing students in the quantity and quality needed to keep this innovation engine going, so companies are finding innovative ways to overcome this, but in the end it does not absolve the government of the responsibility for creating this educational structure.
不是嗎?而這投影片上的最後一點 這個故事裡,有一件事得先說清楚 印度的年輕人還在不斷增加 這項人口紅利,非常好。但很矛盾的 這也讓人有印度有龐大勞工的幻象 印度的教育機溝及教育體系 除了少數例外,無法教育出夠多 所需的高素質學生 來滿足這創新引擎繼續運作 所以企業也努力找尋創新方式以克服這個挑戰 但最終,印度政府仍得 擔起建構教育結構的責任
So finally, I want to conclude by showing you the profile of one company, IBM. As many of you know, IBM has always been considered for the last hundred years to be one of the most innovative companies. In fact, if you look at the number of patents filed over history, I think they are in the top or the top two or three companies in the world of all patents filed in the USA as a private company.
所以,最後,我要用一個公司 --IBM 的結構來作結 大家都知道,IBM在過去百年來 一直都被世人認為是 最創新的公司之一 事實上,就他們公司歷史上所申請的專利來看 我想他們不是第一,第二,就是第三 這是就所有在美國的私人公司所申請的專利數來看
Here is the profile of employees of IBM over the last decade. In 2003, they had 300,000 employees, or 330,000 employees, out of which, 135,000 were in America, 9,000 were in India. In 2009, they had 400,000 employees, by which time the U.S. employees had moved to 105,000, whereas the Indian employees had gone to 100,000.
這是IBM過去10年來 員工結構的基本資料 2003年,有總數30萬員工 或是33萬,其中13萬5千人 在美國,而有9千人在印度 2009年,總數40萬員工,此時 美國員工數降為10萬5千人 而印度員工數則上升到10萬人
Well, in 2010, they decided they're not going to reveal this data anymore, so I had to make some estimates based on various sources. Here are my best guesses. Okay? I'm not saying this is the exact number, it's my best guess. It gives you a sense of the trend. There are 433,000 people now at IBM, out of which 98,000 are remaining in the U.S., and 150,000 are in India. So you tell me, is IBM an American company, or an Indian company? (Laughter)
2010 年時,他們決定不再揭露這項資訊 所以我只能估計 根據不同來源的資料來估計 這是我能猜到最近的數字. 要知道,我可沒說 這是個精確的數字,這是我的猜測 讓你對趨勢有個概念 今天,IBM有43萬3千員工 其中9萬8千人在美國 15萬人在印度 你說吧,IBM還是美國公司嗎? 還是間印度公司?(笑聲)
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. (Applause)
女士先生們,謝謝!(掌聲)