Trade Mission at Work

India’s largest trading partner is the United States. And although India is Minnesota’s 23rd-ranked trade partner, in 2007 Minnesota exported a healthy $120 million to the country out of a total of $16.2 billion in manufactured goods, according to the Minnesota Trade Office.

An increase in trade between India and Minnesota, and more specifically exports to India, is expected for 2008. It’s a trend that could be attributed in large part to Minnesota’s trade mission to India in October 2007.

One new business relationship forged during the mission, which was organized by the Minnesota Trade Office, was that of New Boundary Technologies, Inc., a provider of IT management and remote monitoring of computer hardware headquartered in Minneapolis, and Taarak India Private, Ltd., a provider of software and computer security services based in New Delhi.

The two companies first made contact during the trade mission, which was led by Governor Tim Pawlenty and included visits to New Delhi, Bangalore, and Mumbai—three of India’s largest cities. Seventy-three business leaders and state officials attended U.S. Commercial Service briefings, had one-on-one meetings with potential partners, visited top Indian companies IBM, Wipro Technologies, and the Tata Group, and engaged in panel discussions geared at fostering stronger relationships between Minnesotan and Indian business markets.

Building the Partnership

Tom Diamond, president of New Boundary, says that the mission to India was New Boundary’s fourth trade mission. (New Boundary has been to China, Poland, and the Czech Republic previously on missions.) The company knew it wanted to enter the Indian market and was expecting to meet possible distributor partners during the mission.

“India in general is growing phenomenally, and really one of the catalysts is information technology,” Diamond says. “India is not a market that we had traditionally been in, so we were specifically looking for an opportunity to partner with a local distributor.” Kim Pearson, New Boundary’s CEO, met with Harish Tyagi, Taarak’s CEO, and Jose Kurian, the company’s COO, during the initial meeting.

“I think it was an opportunity to really be entrenched in the culture, in the environment, and in how they do business,” Diamond says. Taarak will distribute New Boundary’s products and provide services throughout India. “It gave us the opportunity to meet some of the companies in India and, in the end find, one partner . . . and potentially other partners that could be a match down the line,” Diamond adds.