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Data Quest Article, 06/2010, Ganesh Natarajan
 
 
Driving along the hot desert highway from Riyadh to al Khobar in Saudi Arabia reminded me of the late Dewang Mehta’s favourite story about the beginnings of the Indian Software industry. An Arab Sheikh in a Bedouin camp in Saudi Arabia dies and leaves seventeen camels to be distributed among his three sons. His brethren gather around and find a will which says that half his property should go to the first son, a third to his second and a ninth to his third. Bemused at doing this without doing the unthinkable act of chopping up a camel, they send a fax (this is the eighties, remember) to TCS and wait and watch.
A few weeks later a young software engineer Ramasubramanian comes along riding a camel across the Persian desert. When briefed about the problem he offers his own camel to solve the problem thereby creating a pool of eighteen camels, nine of which are given to the first son, six to the second and two to the third. That still leaves one camel and he says “That was always mine” and rides back to Mumbai with it. This, Dewang used to say is the ability of the Indian software engineer, to use intellect and solve the world’s complex problems. What is amusing today is that in a world where six inches of revival seems to be followed by seven inches of retreat – the latest Euro collapse is one such catastrophe and the signs in Europe and even UK are not very encouraging, the quest for new markets is leading us back to the oil rich states of Suadi, Qatar, Abu Dhabi.
In five interesting days meeting opinion leaders in Riyadh, Dhammam, Al Khobar, Abu Dhabi and Dubai, the opportunities as well as the challenges of building a successful business in this part of the world came into sharp focus. The SWITCH companies from India have been early movers in these territories while later entrants like Zensar have used superior skills in specific horizontals like Oracle and SAP and verticals like Retail and Manufacturing to capture opportunity share in this market. Saudi Arabia is a truly vibrant economy today with huge growth potential beyond the traditional Oil and Gas segment in Manufacturing Retail and Distribution and newer verticals like Financial Services Education e-Government – everything in fact except entertainment. And entertainment will continue to be a focus for the Emirates with Abu Dhabi playing tortoise to Dubai’s hare and investing hundreds of billions of dollars in creating life style islands around what was once a very boring part of the Gulf.
For the naysayers who believe that the recessionary storm has dashed Dubai’s hopes to dust, a visit may be called for. It is true that the recovery after the meteoric rise in this glittering desert oasis is slow but if one ignores the sharp rise and fall since the end of 2008, the graph will show that there is a steady rise in economic growth and even segments like real estate, retail and hospitality are showing revival. Chairing a session at the well attended Supply Chain & Logistics conference, I was encouraged to note the rapid progress being made in this area in the Gulf and the technology infusion in Dubai World and Dubai Trade are worthy of emulation by logistics planners in our own country. And while the immigration lines at Riyadh are still chaotic, the focus on local skills development and the willingness to let women work in most corporations starting with Saudi Aramco the oil major, demonstrate a commitment to join the next wave of leaders in the world of business and commerce.
There are still challenges of course. While English may have become the language of choice for business in most parts of the Middle East, the user community still expects a working knowledge of Arabic and the moves by WIPRO and the erstwhile Satyam to set up centers in Egypt are seen as good investments to tap the market more efficiently. Serious investors in the market will need to look at alternative supply bases in Egypt Jordan or even Tunisia and seriously consider Dhaka or even Lahore for an alternate global delivery center that services the Middle East market. And Mr Ramasubramanian may not find the availability of cuisine to his liking and will need to make some culinary compromises to execute projects well, particularly in Saudi Arabia. But our intrepid software engineers have surmounted such challenges in Europe Latin America, Africa and even China and should not find this too much of a hurdle to overcome. Let us continue to look for new horizons in a changing world!
   
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