India’s Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna pointed to Frugal Engineering from India as a signpost of what the 21st Century will be all about. “The 20th Century was one of Capital Accumulation but the 21st century is one of innovation,” he said while delivering the keynote address for the 35th annual summit of the US-India Business Council in Washington, DC on Wednesday this week.
Krishna echoed the thoughts about the recently deceased Prof C.K. Prahalad of the University of Michigan and his book “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid.” Prahlad had exhorted companies to look at the poor as a profitable market. (In India, foreign companies such as Unilever and Citi have joined Indian entities such as SKS Microfinance and CavinKare in showing how poor people can benefit from modern marketing and can be a source of profit). Krishna referred to the Tata Swach water purifier and the Nano automobile as examples of India’s innovation.
He said that 200 Fortune 500 companies have R&D. Operations in India. Krishna asserted that India has a 100 percent compliance record in respecting security and agreements, to safeguard American defense technology, for example.
(Via blackberry live from USIBC summit, edited slightly later).
For full speech, click here.
Last updated: December 26th, 2025
