I posted a TED talk by academic Vijay Govindarajan over 10 years ago in this blog. It’s interesting what happened to the companies mentioned: Freshdesk (IPOed as Freshworks in 2021); Xiaomi (Smartphones and now, EVs) ; Misfit Wearables (acquired by Fossil). All have deep Asia roots with founders originating from there and investing heavily in overseas R&D. Smartphone maker Xiaomi was able to launch an SUV in less that 5 years that just beat Tesla in China sales. I mentioned in a prior post about Chinese open source AI platform DeepSeek.

The innovation dominance of America versus the rest of the world, especially Asia is unlikely to persist without protecting American patents and labor. Similar to the intent of the Chips Act, more needs to be done to ensure America doesn’t get left behind. America’s educational system still favors rote learning over entrepreneurship. Kids in Asia will lap American children if the US government and American-led companies don’t prioritize entrepreneurial education.

Professor Govindarajan was right about reverse innovation. What happens overseas won’t stay overseas. If the robots and rockets can’t be built fast enough, they will be done overseas and eventually, flood the zone here via trade. TikTok is a prime example of this narrative.

How does America regain its strength in innovation? That’s the real question for the sake of the American economy. The best and brightest don’t necessarily come from America as witnessed by Elon’s journey. How does America accept the reality of reverse innovation?