India Curbs Power of Amazon and Walmart To Sell Products Online (nytimes.com) 135
The Indian government dealt a surprise blow on Wednesday to the e-commerce ambitions of Amazon and Walmart, effectively barring the American companies from selling products supplied by affiliated companies on their Indian shopping sites and from offering their customers special discounts or exclusive products. From a report: If strictly interpreted, the new policies could force significant changes in the India strategies of the retail giants. Amazon might have to stop competing with independent sellers and end its offerings of proprietary products like its Echo smart speakers in India, its top emerging market. For Walmart, which spent $16 billion this year to buy 77 percent of Flipkart, India's leading online retailer, the new rules could hamper its strategy of selling clothing and other products under its own private brands and prevent it from using its supply-chain expertise and clout with retailers to drive down prices for Indian consumers.
[...] The government posted the changes, which go into effect Feb. 1, without warning on Wednesday evening in New Delhi, while much of the business world in both countries was on vacation. [...] Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India initially courted foreign companies to invest more in the country after his 2014 election victory, but his administration has turned protectionist as his party's re-election prospects have dimmed in recent months. Mr. Modi has increasingly sought to bolster Indian firms and curb foreign ones through new policies, including one that requires foreign companies like Visa, Mastercard and American Express to store all data about Indians on computers inside the country.
[...] The government posted the changes, which go into effect Feb. 1, without warning on Wednesday evening in New Delhi, while much of the business world in both countries was on vacation. [...] Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India initially courted foreign companies to invest more in the country after his 2014 election victory, but his administration has turned protectionist as his party's re-election prospects have dimmed in recent months. Mr. Modi has increasingly sought to bolster Indian firms and curb foreign ones through new policies, including one that requires foreign companies like Visa, Mastercard and American Express to store all data about Indians on computers inside the country.
Re: declaration of economic war (Score:2)
Actually the rumbling about a "trade war" with China has strengthened America's economic ties with Japan, Korea, and Vietnam.
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The top export destinations of South Korea are China ($121B), the United States ($70.1B), https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en... [mit.edu]
https://vietnamnews.vn/economy... [vietnamnews.vn]
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So if an Indian buys something from a resident of the European Union or vice versa, where is the personal data associated with the transaction stored?
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Tit for Tat (Score:3, Insightful)
The easiest fix is to play the H-1B card.
Don't want American companies as competition in your country ?
No problem, how about we don't allow Indian workers into the H-1B Visa program . . . . at all ?
( It is, pretty much, the only thing we import from India )
Wouldn't want the competition destroying American jobs now would we ? :|
Re:Tit for Tat (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Tit for Tat (Score:5, Insightful)
the talented ones can work just as well from india.
the ones are are ordinary and have no special talents are not needed here.
india and china are showing true colors, as time goes on. I hope we start to reduce reliance on foreign labor and imports.
the h1b program was never about 'best and brightest', so stop right there. if we halted 100% of labor imports from the far east, we'd be fine. the ceo's would worry since they would have to pay real american wages to locals, but they'd get used to it. they were used to it, once.
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The H1B/L1/ visas are just incentives for companies like TCS, Infosys, et al to retain employees who'd otherwise get major salary hikes just by hopping b/w companies. As long as they are simply in Bangalore/Pune/Gurgaon/Hyderabad doing projects, there is nothing binding them to the company or preventing them from giving a 2-week notice. But once they're on an H1B, they're pretty much captive by the company, unless the company they want to move to is willing to do an H1B visa transfer for them.
So yeah, t
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Oh yeah, all those H-1B workers supplied by TCS are the best and brightest India has to offer.
Re: Tit for Tat (Score:2)
Indian outsourcing companies are like Walmart. Everyone knows they suck, by almost every metric. But they're so cheap they drive all the competition out of business.
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Yes we should force their talented developers to stay in India. That will show them who's boss.
Why would their talented developers come here? They can work from anywhere, and their money will go much further at home. They're not sending us their best and brightest. They're sending us their poorly educated. I would as well were I in their position, but there's really no good reason for the USA to import any tech workers from India. There is only short-term profit.
Re:Tit for Tat (Score:5, Insightful)
If you bother to read the summary they are not banning American brands, they are actually doing something like what H1B is supposed to do: preventing unfair competition.
It's more like heading off an antitrust problem. American companies are established and have huge capital behind them, and will crust the emerging online market in India. So just like H1B is supposed to stop foreign workers undercutting US ones on wages and flooding the market with cheap labour, India is making sure that American companies can't flood it with cheap products and massive discounts that the local talent can't match.
It's likely calculated to try to force the US market to open up a bit too, as India knows that it is an important area of growth for many US companies.
the rules are unrealistic and thus... (Score:5, Insightful)
The rules, if applied with strict interpretation, would pretty much shut down any modern retailer of any type, not just the big guys. It essentially bans having fixed arrangements with suppliers - of having supply chains period.
Virtually all chains have deals they've made with suppliers. Enforced strictly, this bans modern commerce.
Therefore, it will not be enforced strictly. It will be enforced selectively.
This is the kind of thing you come up with as a gift to government officials. The public reason is just an excuse. It is a beautiful setup for a graft. Pay the right folks the right amounts, no problems.
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It's India, new rules just mean that some palms needs some extra greasing.
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Bullshirt. The actions hurt anti-competitive behaviour. Secret commissions, secret exclusivity and sweetheart deals, advance payment, exclusivity payments and price fixing arrangements. Good on India for implementing old British consumer protection laws (that have been rolled back in Britain).
Aliexpress for example is reasonably fair, and everyone can dropship equally, and Mr Indian shopkeeper does not need to pay upfront $200,000 to join the club.
Yup discrimatory supplier chains are under threat, then stop
Re:the rules are unrealistic and thus... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's commonly called bait and switch. They invited in foreign investment under corporate friendly rules and once sufficient foreign investment was bound, they altered the rules to give back advantage to local businesses, they got Darth Vadered https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]. The rules will continue to change, until Indian businesses have replaced Amazon and Wallmart, oh yeah.
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Virtually all chains have deals they've made with suppliers.
But this doesn't imply exclusivity. Suppliers can make deals with multiple retail chains. And retail chains can carry competing products. Volume discounts can be given, but not so as to exclude other manufacturers*.
*Of course, there is the case of that infamous s/w maker that got shot down for offering license discounts once their product was installed on every enterprise desktop. So they went back and re-wrote the contract to offer the discount for a defined number of seats. Which just happened to equal t
Ironic that India does this (Score:1)
As an American IT pro, I don't much like India for obvious reasons. But this is the right thing to do.
Re: Ironic that India does this (Score:1)
All this does is add another layer of middle man, I mean intermediary corporation to the process. The natural way to comply with this law is to create another shell company, based out of India, call it Amazindia.com which licenses/leases/passes everything through AmazonUSA and nets zero profit.
It's like people.who want a mom and pop hardware but bitch about how expensive it is vs ordering it direct from Amazon. They still go to the hardware store, for keys and knick knacks, but if they needed a power hammer
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Look up what an arms-length transaction means.
Sure nobody has been good at enforcing this due to lack of proof. India declares as the ultimate owner and intention is to frustrate local laws, to be invalid.
The real sticky point is overseas forex payments will be tracked and traced, and hopefully some senior execs nabbed in Canada for extradition.
Re: Ironic that India does this (Score:1)
Wow what an educated reply! I am amazed at your superior genes and exceptional intelect. Did your uncle go Harvard and do the nuclear?
Blame blame blame blame (Score:3)
Re: Blame blame blame blame (Score:2)
Better authoritarian populism than totalitarian oligarchy.
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Better by what metric?
Re: Blame blame blame blame (Score:2)
All of them.
What about shutting down the site? (Score:2)
I do agree with the person above who guessed this is really to be selectively used and a "legal way" for govn't workers to obtain graft.
Regrets (Score:2)
This is where Bezos begins to regret his confrontational stance with the executive branch.
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You mean where Amazon refuses to bid on the new DoD Cloudy Thing? Or where Amazon refuses to set up a sweet deal where the Fed. Gov. gets access to Amazon's store for government stuff and services?
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Only total idiots and SJWs turn down getting paid billions of dollars to help their own country's military. Bezos is not an idiot.
Re: Somebody in India is Fishing for a Bribe (Score:2)
No way. $1 million isn't enough to get even one cabinet minster's kid admitted to Stanford. Think bigger!
Seems like sensible policies actually (Score:5, Insightful)
A) The prohibition against special discounts prevents either company from discounting their merchandise in an anti-competitive manner that would drive out local businesses.
B) The prohibition against selling exclusive products makes it so that if Amazon wants to sell Echo and Fire devices in India, then they have to allow Indian resellers to stock and sell the products as well. The same would apply to any of their other private labels (like Amazon Basics). This prevents them from having a monopoly on sales of anything carrying their brand in India. This is sensible separation that should exist between Amazon's manufacturing business and it's internet storefront business.
We've gotten so used to anti-monopolistic policies not being enforced in the US that we've forgotten what they even are. No company is supposed be allowed to become an Umbrella company that makes, sells and supplies everything.
How much has Amazon's manufacturing arm benefited from the huge exposure platform provided by their storefront? I couldn't tell you the last time I went to Amazon's front page and didn't have a giant Fire or Echo ad shoved in my face.
How many businesses has Walmart put under every time it moves into an area and used anti-competitive price structures built off of paying their employees the least amount possible along with the fewest benefits they can get away with?
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India already has an Umbrella company: Tata
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>A) The prohibition against special discounts prevents either company from discounting their merchandise in an anti-competitive manner that would drive out local businesses.
NO NO NO! This is exactly what competitive is! You undercut, you have enough size to hold out while others go under, and then when there are no competitors or there's a monopsony you ratchet up your prices! Meantime telling people and politicians that at all times your pricing is based on market competition. Because it's true.
Sheesh.
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Not quite what PP was saying. Nike has to sell their shoes through other shoe stores. Likewise, Microsoft products and s/w are available at Best Buy. Nike and Microsoft can operate their own stores, but not as the exclusive outlet of their products.
Tesla would have been a better example. But auto dealerships are covered by some special regulations.
Indians are the ones who suffer (Score:1)
I wouldn't be happy about that.
The message I would get is people think I am too incapable, too stupid to know how much Amazon is oppressing me.
Modi got 1000 problems, but this aint one... (Score:2)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India initially courted foreign companies to invest more in the country after his 2014 election victory, but his administration has turned protectionist as his party's re-election prospects have dimmed in recent months. Mr. Modi has increasingly sought to bolster Indian firms and curb foreign ones through new policies, including one that requires foreign companies like Visa, Mastercard and American Express to store all data about Indians on computers inside the country.
The current BJP govt did not get protectionist all of a sudden. E-Commerce policy changes are not an important topic for any partys re-election prospects.
There are far more serious issues for Indian electorate...farmer distress, rising unemployment, promises not being kept, effects of super stupid demonetization, GST implementation etc. Add social polarisation of the country with Hindu-Muslim division being played for the BJP's right wing Hindu support base .
Stray cows roaming around is probably more
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Mr. Modi has increasingly sought to bolster Indian firms and curb foreign ones through new policies, including one that requires foreign companies like Visa, Mastercard and American Express to store all data about Indians on computers inside the country.
Actually, implementing such a policy isn't protectionist. It is just common sense. After all, as an American living in the US, I wouldn't want my US financial data being stored anywhere else but the US.
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So in-sourcing bad now?
Where to store international transactions? (Score:2)
requires foreign companies like Visa, Mastercard and American Express to store all data about Indians on computers inside the country.
implementing such a policy isn't protectionist. It is just common sense. After all, as an American living in the US, I wouldn't want my US financial data being stored anywhere else but the US.
The summary lacks a citation to the statute or regulation in question, and my subscription package happens not to include The New York Times. But if information about transactions involving Americans must be stored only in America, and information about transactions involving Indians must be stored only in India, that appears to leave nowhere to store information about a transaction between an American and an Indian.
Deep state defined (Score:2)
the first time anyone heard the term "deep state" was in [The New York Times'] reporting on Egypt. Now they claim anyone who mentions "deep states" is a paranoid nutter.
Wherever you see "deep state," read it as "institutional memory of the civil service" and see if the article still makes sense. Is that a good rule of thumb?
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Yeah, tell it to the people that scream and cry that it's a "conspiracy theory" when Trump talks about the deep state then...
Re: Deep state defined (Score:2)
Most folks who get worked up about the "deep state" would be better off turning their attention to the parastate - the "broad state" that includes both the democratically controlled government and the many oligarchic corporations and NGOs that have become so intertwined with it as to be inseparable. The average big bank oppresses more people in an afternoon than the CIA has time to oppress in a year.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
According to the journalist Robert Worth, "The expression deep state had originated in Turkey in the 1990s, where the military colluded with drug traffickers and hit men to wage a dirty war against Kurdish insurgents".[10] +
I never looked that up before. Just assumed(made an ass out of me) that I knew the defination
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It's protectionist in the sense that it requires contracting with (or building) an Indian datacenter, assuming they didn't do so already. If the data, while in motion, has to interact with servers outside of India, that arguably decreases security compared to it being stored and processed in the same location. This is to give India's govt. the authority to subpoena anything they might want 'to catch terrists', and isn't for customers' security.
Re: Good (Score:2, Interesting)
The problem with datacenters in India is reliable power. My previous company had the notion several times, but the infrastructure makes that very difficult.
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After all, as an American living in the US, I wouldn't want my US financial data being stored anywhere else but the US.
As an American living in the US, I would want my US financial data stored anywhere except the US.
I think you have an odd perception of which entity an American should fear most (hint: it isn't foreigners).
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In the end, your only option is to force your card issuer to generate a new one.
Indeed. When I see an unauthorized recurring charge on my CC, I don't fight to get it cancelled. I just report my card stolen and request a replacement.
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Asia is over 60% of the worlds population
Asia is where all the real economic growth is happening
This is a growing sign that Asia cares less and less about the USA.
Trump WILL do something stupid in retaliation which will only increase the growing rift between the USA and the world.
Re: Indian is a third world piece of trash (Score:1)
Strangely, the world thinks the same about the president of USA
Re: Indian is a third world piece of trash (Score:1)
People who love America hate him too.
Re: Nice idea, won't apply? (Score:1)
So if a transaction involves a EU citizen and an Indian citizen, where does the transaction get stored?