The 2025 Nobel Prize in Economics (Philippe Aghion, Peter Howitt, Joel Mokyr) offered a timely lesson for nations aspiring to global leadership: Prosperity is not just about having resources, but about institutions that generate “useful knowledge”. As Mokyr argues, innovation happens only when “propositional knowledge” (the abstract science of why) meets “prescriptive knowledge” (the practical technique of how).

For India, aspiring towards a $30-trillion economy by 2047, this distinction is critical. We have successfully built a reputation as the world’s service provider and back office. Yet, in a world where supply chains are weaponised and capital flows along geopolitical fault lines, this is no longer enough. To secure true resilience, India must transition from importing technology to creating it.

The challenge is not a lack of talent. India ranks third globally in scientific publications and fourth in PhDs awarded. We excel at the early stages of discovery — what experts call technology readiness levels (TRL) 1-3. Our labs are proficient at producing papers. But an industrial economy runs on products, not papers.

The journey from a lab bench to a market-ready product involves piloting, prototyping, validation, and standardisation — stages known as TRL 4-7. This is India’s “Valley of........

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