While India has become a gold mine for business investment companies in the last decade, one of the leading investment firms in the United States still feels the Asian country has not reached its full economic potential.
Charles Kaye, co-president of New York-based Warburg Pincus, and Dalip Pathak, its managing director, gave a lecture to students and businessmen regarding commerce on the Indian subcontinent last night.
"Despite the hassles, India's work is constantly getting better," Pathak said.
Pathak related the story of Bharti Enterprises, an Indian company that was transformed into a multi-billion dollar company through the investment of Warburg Pincus.
He called Bharti a "landmark investment" -- Warburg Pincus invested a total of $300 million. It's now worth $2 billion.
Bharti is now the largest telecommunication company in India, and Pathak hopes to achieve similar feats in other industrial sectors.
But his goal was not to display the success of his company.
"This is about the unexploited potential of India," he said, "if you are focused ... India today permits you the opportunity to create multibillion-dollar companies."
Pathak insisted that India will only keep growing in the coming years fueled by the support of American companies.
"The potential rate of growth is based on population, but you have to make that a reality," he added.
The real challenge, he said, is combating the underdeveloped infrastructure and poverty.
Out of 155 economies rated by the World Bank on the ease of doing business, India was ranked 116, compared to the United States' rank of 3.
Both students and faculty found the lecture to be eye-opening.
"It was very insightful -- it gave me ideas of what to expect in the future," Engineering senior Jeevan Puthiamadathil said.
"It gave an inside view from two people who know the situation," said Jack Nagel, the associate dean for graduate studies. "The sense of limitless possibilities was very exciting, particularly when you think how in the past India was stagnant with a lot of poverty."
