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India’s Digital Economy Must Foster Choice, Competition and Innovation, Say Experts

New Delhi/Gurugram [India], July 31: Digital Economy in India must offer choice to the consumers, sustain the competition in the marketplace and foster innovation, according to global and Indian experts while speaking at a webinar to launch the Initiative on Choice, Competition and Innovation (ICCI) under the aegis of Centre for The Digital Future (CDF). 

“It’s reasonable to have a first pass at targeting the largest firms and focusing on specific problems”, said Professor Jaques Cremer of Toulouse School of Economics. Taking cognizance of the changing paradigm brought about by digital innovations, he added, “Many other regulations and laws also affect the digital sector.” Hence, thoughtful implementation is the key, he concluded.

Drawing upon research on the evolution of innovation ecosystems nurtured by corporates, Professor Ashish Arora of Duke University urged the Indian policymakers to create conducive conditions for creating an innovation culture such that “investment in technology pay off more than other types of investments.”

Dr Derek Ritzmann, Director, Economics Partners, averred that most attributes of digital platforms like network effects and gatekeeping are not entirely novel concepts or phenomena. He added that economies of scale could be either positive or negative, depending on the specific context.

Dr GregorLangus, Director, E.CA Economics, underscored the importance of investment in standardization as a competitive advantage, as seen in Europe’s success in mobile telephony technology and equipment. He added that while adopting “me-too” measures is easy, the enforcement varies across jurisdictions.

Dr Payal Malik, Advisor, Economics, Competition Commission of India (CCI), asserted that the competition law is robust and flexible in dealing with the Digital economy’s challenges. She added that “Ambiguity has to be internalized in the assessment of conduct, and any antitrust policy which focuses on the market activity should be backed by a clear economic analysis of the likely effects.”

Former Member of the CCI Dr Geeta Gouri supported the concept of ‘Different Folks, Different Strokes’ by contextualizing CCI’s rapid maturity by leveraging the legal provisions to deal with the evolving scenarios, particularly pertaining to mergers. She added that while India does look at other jurisdictions, CCI’s unique approach must be seen in the context of political economy, socio-cultural diversity and digital adoption primarily through mobile phones.

Dr Chirantan Chaatterjee of IIM Ahmedabad pointed out the need to create deeper research linkages across academia and industry to realize the benefits of public-private partnerships.

Mr R Chandrashekhar, Chairperson of CDF and former Secretary, Telecom & IT and President, NASSCOM,had chaired the discussion during the inaugural session held on 29 July featuring a keynote by Mr Ashok Kumar Gupta, Chairman, Competition Commission of India (CCI). Other distinguished speakers included Dr Vijay Kelkar, former Chairman, Finance Commission and former Finance Secretary and Dr R A Mashelkar, former Director-General, Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and Ms Shilpa Kumar, Partner, Omidyar Network India. 

Dr Shubhashis Gangopadhyay, Vice-Chairperson, CDF; Mr Deepak Maheshwari, Senior Fellow, CDF and Dr Nishant Chadha, Head of Research, CDF, moderated the respective panel discussions. 

CDF’s ICCI is meant to serve as a platform to encourage thought processes aimed at enhancing discussions. They could be around the subjects of choice for consumer and user benefits, competition within & across sectors, and innovation as seen by the entry of new products, services & players across the digital economy and linking high-value outputs with the pragmatic implementation of solutions to challenges. CDF is an autonomous entity within the India Development Foundation (IDF), a private non-profit research organization.

About CDF 

CDF was launched on 30 October 2019 with a vision to conduct actionable research on the impact of digitization on the economy and society. The inquiries are analytical, without any pre-determined bias, multi-dimensional and evidence-based, and provide policy and regulatory insights that enable the transition to an optimal digital economy and society.

The Centre was established and incubated as an entity by the India Development Foundation (IDF), a private non-profit research organization set up as a Trust, in 2003. The Initiative on Choice, Competition and Innovation (ICCI) at CDF is a research initiative that serves the vital objective of disseminating distilled thoughts resulting from academic research about choice, competition and innovation in the digital domain to a diverse spectrum of stakeholders for the greater good.

For more information contact:

Dr Muralikrishna Kumar, Chief Operating Officer, CDF:  cm@cdfresearch.org