Indian government should learn something from Chinese companies. Huawei has announced that it would invest more than $4 billion in fixed broadband technology research and development (R&D) in the next three years.

This comes out to be $1.3 billion per annum. Now compare this with India’s ambitious Digital India project that aims to achieve zero import of electronic equipment in India, provide broadband to all Village Panchayats etc. The project has no focus on R&D. It would appropriate to say that it is silent on R&D.

How can there be any manufacturing without R&D? It can only be low level of assembly type activity, counterpart of body shopping in software.

Huawei had recently shifted its focus to the mobile device market. It said that fixed broadband, the pipes connecting homes and offices, remained a "key direction for strategic investment."

In a statement, the company said investing in fixed broadband technology will be important given the rise of high-resolution video technology, which for instance powers 4K television sets as well as commercial big data operations that also consume significant bandwidth.