Legal Framework and Issues Impacting the Business Environment Faced by Foreign Companies Investing in India

This book deals with the complex and often challenging process for international companies in expanding their business through investing in the Indian emerging market. The process of globalization has allowed for the progressive fading of economic, commercial, and technological boundaries. This has resulted in Multinational firms or enterprises becoming increasingly referred to as key players in the world market over the course of the past fifty years. Inward Foreign Direct Investment flows have increased significantly, not only worldwide, but specifically towards newly-industrialized countries such as India. They are focused on trying to attract foreign investments, due to the lack of domestic savings, and thus as a stable means of foreign capital inflow. In addition to this, there are multiple, other positive effects on macroeconomic variables, such as productivity, production capacity, level of employment, factor prices, technological know-how, and overall economic growth. Corporations and firms, on the other hand, internationalize towards developing countries in an effort to seek and reap the multiple benefits found in these destination countries. Such benefits include reduced production costs, given by lower relative wages and country endowment of resources, as well as market expansion possibilities. The scope of their needs is determined by the type of strategy adopted, which can distinguish between market seeking, resource seeking, efficiency seeking and strategic investments. The Indian market offers relatively low-cost labor, an enormous pool of possible consumers and many other benefits. When time is taken to fully understand the characteristics of the country and its business culture one can extract the huge rewards. If on the other hand, investors make quick decisions and do not fully review all aspects which might create a risk, the investment may result in serious and substantial failures with large losses of capital. As in many developing countries, Indian laws and regulations are constantly evolving. These laws reflect the political compromise needed to balance the complex and conflicting demands of multiple constituencies. The result of this compromise is a high turnover of laws and regulations which, among other things, are passed through a trial and error basis. This entails that ineffective and inefficient laws may be passed and then substituted once they are tested as not working, having unintended consequences and being impracticable. The constant change and poor formulation leave, at times, room for interpretation especially by lower levels of government officials leading in turn to the possibility of corruptions. This, together with the inefficient judiciary, due not to its quality, but to the extensive time in court cases as well as non-streamlined and improperly implemented process and regulations, leads the investor to a perceive low protection and high risk throughout many phases of the investment. The book offers a useful overview for foreign enterprises on the complex, sometimes intricate process of investing in India, assisting them in gathering great opportunities through overtaking challenges.