FEATURE // From India to South Africa: Lessons in building an emerging market economy
What India’s transformation reveals about entrepreneurship, regional diversity, and inclusive growth
Last week, we announced the publication of a new case in our collection for Harvard Business Impact: “Dimexon: Entrepreneurial success and inclusive leadership for female empowerment”. The case follows the Indian diamond manufacturing company Dimexon from its founding to its present-day innovation in the industry. As the first case in this collection about a company outside of Africa, we are taking a closer look at what we can learn from India’s emerging market.
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India has become one of the world’s fastest growing major economies, transforming itself from a largely agrarian economy into a global force in technology, manufacturing, and services. Its rise is particularly striking given its scale and diversity: a population nearing 1.5 billion people, 28 states, hundreds of major languages (over a 1000 recorded mother tongues), and significant differences in income, infrastructure and access to economic opportunity. Yet India’s economic success is not just concentrated in major cities or industries. Bengaluru has emerged as a global technology hub, Hyderabad as a centre for pharmaceuticals and digital services, Chennai as an automotive manufacturing centre, and Surat as the heart of the world’s diamond cutting and polishing industry. Together, these regional economies illustrate how different local capabilities can contribute to national competitiveness.
Indian’s growth has been shaped by several interconnected forces including investment in technical skills, entrepreneurial networks, internationally competitive service industries and an increasingly sophisticated digital infrastructure. Its digital public infrastructure, including the Unified Payments Interface, has helped expand access to low-cost digital transactions, while industrial clusters have enabled businesses to share specialised skills, suppliers, and market connections. However, India’s development has not been without contradictions. Economic growth has been uneven across states, employment opportunities have not always kept pace with the expanding workforce, and women’s participation in paid work remains a challenge. India’s experience is therefore not simply a story of economic success, but one of navigating the tensions between growth, inequality, and inclusion.
These tensions are particularly relevant to South Africa. Both countries have substantial economic disparities, geographically concentrated industries, a large informal economy, and communities that remain excluded from mainstream economic opportunities. India’s experience raises several questions for South African policymakers and businesses. Could stronger regional industrial clusters help smaller cities develop distinctive economic identities beyond Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Durban? What might South Africa learn from India’s investment in digital payment infrastructure and its ability to connect small businesses to wider markets? And how could businesses create employment by developing skills within communities rather than relying exclusively on existing pools of qualified workers? India’s achievements offer useful lessons, but its challenges also demonstrate that economic growth alone does not guarantee broad-based property.
The experience of Indian businesses provides another perspective on this transformation. Dimexon, a diamond manufacturing company founded in 1966, built international business from Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, outside India’s established diamond-processing hub of Surat. Its decision to recruit and train women from surrounding communities illustrates how entrepreneurs can develop competitive capabilities by recognising talent and opportunities that established industries may overlook. As Dimexon celebrates its 60th anniversary, its journey offers a window into the broader story of Indian enterprise: the importance of regional ecosystems, the evolution of entrepreneurial leadership, and the possibilities and limitations of inclusive business growth.
Read the case
To explore these themes further, head over to our latest collection of cases with Harvard Business Impact and read Dimexon: Entrepreneurial success and inclusive leadership for female empowerment.
By Shivani Ghai
