Articles by Rakesh Basant

Almost all earlier studies comparing pharmaceutical prices in Pakistan and India have attributed higher prices in Pakistan mainly to the differences in the intellectual property rights regime between the two countries. That Pakistan permits product patents while India does not is factually incorrect. This paper argues that a weak patent regime combined with policies to reduce market concentration, curb monopolies and encourage bulk drug production, initially through public sector investments, and the size of the Indian market could have led to development of indigenous process capabilities. Meanwhile, in Pakistan, the same patent policy was not combined with policies adopted in India and since the market size is much smaller, it did not have the same effect.

The Indian Information Technology (IT) sector has seen significant growth in terms of employment and revenue and is expected to provide quality employment to a large number of workers in the coming years. A more widespread participation of workers with different skill/education profiles, gender, regions, etc, would facilitate deepening of the labour market and eventually reduce costs. This paper hopes to provide a tentative understanding of the processes that have been important for the evolution of the IT labour market in India. It analyses NASSCOM and National Sample Survey (NSS) data to explore the processes that deepen the IT labour market in India. The analysis suggests that deepening is actually taking place, but the pace can probably be enhanced. Transition to the offshore model, growth of the ITES sector, competition and infrastructure-led movement of IT activity to smaller cities, and hiring of workers with diverse education backgrounds and of women workers have facilitated the deepening processes. However these processes need to be intensified.

The impact of economic reforms can be assessed and policy fine-tuned by examining changes in corporate strategies in response to the reforms. This article analyses available evidence to find that industrial concerns have been consolidating their activities to retain competitiveness but research and development has suffered. Quality upgradation is a priority but product differentiation is favoured over improvement in marketing and distribution. Export orientation is limited.

Some Issues Rakesh Basant Dissatisfaction with the definition of industries has led to the defining and use of the concept of strategic groups which differentiate a group of firms from others within a given industry in terms of their strategic choices. This paper attempts a selective review of studies pertaining to technology strategy to explore parameters which can be used to define strategic groups within an industry. It is argued that the nature of technology, industry and firm characteristics have major implications for theory and action related to the content of technology strategy and for the processes through which it is developed and implemented.

Market Segmentation in Urban Areas Rakesh Basant Urban Poverty and the Labour Market: Access to Jobs and Incomes in Asian and Latin American Cities edited by Gerry Rodgers; International Labour Office, Geneva, 1989; pp XV + 257, 35 Swiss francs.