Two way traffic, we're all offshore

News in January that Tata Consultancy Services had strengthened its board and that Cisco had restructured its Asia Pacific operations further confirm, if confirmation were needed, that the centre of gravity for global economic activity is shifting towards the countries of South East Asia.

Tata has long been a growing force on many fronts and has accumulated experience in so many and diverse fields that the business is almost able to step into any sector using its own, home grown, expertise. But we have to ask whether the Tata model of ‘all singing, all dancing’ conglomerate is really the way forward in the long term. Or will the Indian giant and the many other ‘engineering to services’ corporations across the region start to follow the Western development pattern of identifying their core capabilities and… well, disposing of or outsourcing the rest. If so, to whom will they be outsourcing?