As muslim countries progress, why do so many in the west react with anger and jealousy?

A futuristic classroom at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. KAUST is becoming a jealousy magnet.

TechCrunch just published a piece about the inauguration of the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology(KAUST). This institution is absolutely marvelous by all accounts. Not only does it have a $10BN endowment, one of the largest of any institution in the Islamic world,  it also has state of the art facilities, ranging from the world’s 15th most powerful supercomputer (Shaheen), to a nano tech fabrication lab  and the world’s highest resolution immersive visualization display. And these wonders are just the beginning. A lot more lies in wait for students and researchers. Shaheen, for example, will continue to be upgraded and will climb the world supercomputer rankings rapidly. Last but not least, the campus itself, built on 30 sq km, is beautiful.

So, when TechCrunch sent a correspondent to cover the launch of the University and King Abdullah’s inaugural address, I expected that the event would attract the right sort of attention; folks interested in education, and happy to see progress and development. Unfortunately, the reactions on TechCrunch have been largely ugly, to say the least.

Postmodern Pakistan

The Karachi Creek Marina - under construction now and rising fast!

Pakistan is such an absolutely amazing place. If you put that copy of Newsweek down for a moment and think what we’ve built in the last 60 years, I think rationality would require you to be close to awe-struck. Today we are a country on the verge of ascent into globally acknowledged greatness. We were born under circumstances that were supposed to lead to our demise inside of 12 months, according to the Nehru/Mountbatten calculus. Not only are we still around, we are 170 million strong, with consistently increasing GDP, a resilient economy, amazingly intelligent people, brilliant businesspeople and an ever-increasing global role.

Yes, we have our problems, but these are absolutely nothing compared to what we have already surmounted and what we are about to achieve. Let me break it down like so: what are our problems today? Or let me ask this another way, what if we achieved the following:

1) 100% literacy, up from the current 50-60% levels
2) Completely indigenous power production for 100+% of our needs
3) Reduction in population growth to 1.2%, with further annual reductions from there on
4) Control over fringe nihilist elements let loose in our society by X, Y and Z.
5) Impenetrable external defences
6) An economy that produces a trade surplus
7) A quadrupling of GDP (and per capita income)

World Bank slaps Satyam with 8 year ban. Is the Indian Government complicit in cyber espionage?

Raju: In a heck of a lot of trouble. Or is he?

If the title confuses you, let me quickly catch you up on this story. Satyam is one of the largest IT companies in India and has been the darling of the Indian outsourcing industry for some time now. The company is/was run by Ramalinga Raju, who has been hailed as one of the leading lights of Indian enterprise. Well, it so happens, that the World Bank was one of Satyam’s customers, and their experience brought out into the open what we’ve been hearing various murmurs about; that outsourcing to India is becoming increasingly dangerous, and the service delivered by Indian IT companies is continuing to decline. Not only is this reflected in the quality of output, but also in the free-falling standards of plain old-fashioned business ethics.

While working with Satyam, the World Bank discovered that Satyam had been stealing proprietary World Bank information. Yahoo News! had this to say:

“The World Bank move came after bank investigators discovered that spy software was covertly installed on workstations inside the bank’s Washington headquarters”

TechLahore’s Predictions for 2009

The Centaurus in Islamabad... work continues, but completion won't happen in 2009

Last year, I listed out a set of predictions and just recently I evaluated how they turned out. But on to more important business: what’s 2009 going to be like for Pakistan, for the IT industry and for the world at large? There are lots of very important trends unfolding before our eyes and they can cause some pretty dramatic changes to the status-quo. You may have read recently about the Russian Prof. Panarin’s prediction concerning the dissolution of the United States, or various other hypotheses about the economic disasters that are lying in wait for us as we enter 2009… and if you haven’t, I would encourage you to take a look. I won’t say whether I agree or disasgree, but will tell you that 2009 is a phenomenally imporant year for the whole world, and it is never a bad thing to understand the forces behind the change.

And that’s not a bad topic to start with, why is 2009 more important than most other years? Here’s (partially) why:

1) The US is in dire straits, economically and politically. It faces a resurgent Russia, a Rising China and it remains tied up in multiple, expensive conflicts. People in the US realize the shaky ground their country stands on today and want to change things for the better. They wanted ‘change’ bad enough to vote an inexperienced Senator in to the White House, because they associated him with the ability to affect the greatest change. If Obama fails, the World and the US, will both pay a heavy price. Whether or not he is on the path to success will be determined in 2009.

Evaluating TechLahore’s predictions for 2008

Exactly a year ago, I published a list of economic, IT and political predictions for 2008. I guess I didn’t do very badly, but where I was wrong, it was due to my optimism. But then, 2008 has been a pretty tough year for almost the entire world. Plenty of surprising, unsettling things happened and I, for one, am happy its over!

Here’s the scorecard for last year’s predictions:

Nokia GPS maps show Kashmir in Pakistan; violent Indian mobs burn down Nokia outlets

If you ever thought that a little GPS map embedded deep inside a tiny application in a relatively inexpensive piece of consumer technology was, in the grand scheme of things, unimportant and harmless, well, think again. Recent happenings in India will expose your naivete!

Apparently, Nokia cell phones contain GPS maps of Kashmir, which (correctly, from where I stand) show the territory to be part of Pakistan. I can understand how this might chagrin some across our eastern borders, but the magnitude of the reaction has certainly appalled me… The way it all went down was that some right-wing hindu extemists discovered this ‘feature’ in Nokia’s phones and rather than take the conventional route of sending an email to Nokia’s customer service, they took to the streets torching Nokia’s outlets and unleashing a general campaign of vandalism and destruction.

Mobilink being investigated for anti-competitive practices

The Business Recorder broke a story about an investigation that has been launched by the Competition Commission of Pakistan into Mobilink’s restrictive trade practices around their Blackberry offerings. The article highlights one specific area of inquiry, which is the inability for Blackberry handsets to access basic GPRS services without activating RIM data services. I think it’s great the commission is calling these practices to attention. For this specific complaint, I don’t know what Mobilink could do to fix things since RIM employs these unfriendly and downright exploitative methods in other markets as well. Perhaps Blackberry will be banned in Pakistan since they cause their hardware – which the customer buys at full price – to essentially stop working unless a monthly data fee is paid to them, over and above the actual cost of GPRS service from the carrier! More on the report after the fold.

China and Pakistan launch $327M joint venture to upgrade Karakoram Highway for increased trade

Back in the ’60s and ’70s, Pakistan and China cooperated to build the Karakoram Highway, or the “Friendship Road”, which is the world’s highest highway, linking Pakistan with the Chinese mainland, traversing the mountains of the Hindukush. Now, Pakistan and China have announced a joint venture worth $327M dollars that will significantly upgrade the highway and improve its capacity to act as a conduit for trade between the two countries.

Over the last many years, one of the key reasons why economists and policy planners have been bullish about Pakistan’s long term economic and strategic prospects is because of the country’s close cooperation with China. The Gwadar port is seen as a very important resource that Pakistan and China can both leverage for their mutual benefit. China has already made serious investments in securing mineral reserves, iron ore, oil and gas in Africa, and a port in the warm waters of the Arabian sea, linked to the Chinese mainland through rail and highway, is of tremendous value to the PRC as it continues its rapid development.

Government to remove 15% GST on IT equipment in the next budget

Since this sales tax was imposed last year, the general IT industry in Pakistan, local PC/Server manufacturers and IT retailers, have strongly advocated its removal. The 15% General Sales Tax, or GST, is currently applicable to all IT purchases. Critics of the tax argue that it is too soon to impose any inhibitors on the growth of the PC industry and PC/Internet adoption in Pakistan. The Government’s oft-stated goal is to achieve 50% PC penetration in the population in the next 3-5 years; in number terms, this would mean about 80-90 Million PCs in use in Pakistan. These targets will clearly have to be curtailed if the less affluent rural population is expected to pay a 15% premium on the price of a PC.

An interview with Yusuf Hussain, Managing Director, PSEB

Unique Pakistan carries an in-depth interview with Yusuf Husain, Managing Director of the Pakistan Software Export Board. Among other things, Yusuf discusses the rationale behind the $2BN IT market size estimates PSEB uses, the growth rate for the IT sector in Pakistan – pegged at 50% YoY, and the potential for explosive growth in software and services outsourcing. At one point in the interview, Yusuf talks about his belief that in 2 or so years, the IT industry will begin to transform the economy of the country much as India’s IT industry did a few years ago.

Clearly, Yusuf Hussain has the right kind of attitude about developing the IT industry in Pakistan. The PSEB has been much more prominent since he took over and that speaks volumes about his efforts to push things along in a positive direction. Well done, Yusuf!