India should look to China for lessons on building technological capabilities rather than continue relying on a model centred on providing software services to global companies, Zoho Co-founder and Chief Scientist Sridhar Vembu said on Tuesday.

Speaking at YourStory's TechSparks 2026 in Bengaluru, Vembu argued that China had successfully built and retained ownership of critical technologies, allowing it to capture economic value and develop globally competitive businesses. "As much as we think of China as adversaries, I actually look to them as gurus," Vembu said.

"Chinese technology landscape has many more lessons to offer us than America does today," he added.

Vembu said Zoho's own journey had drawn inspiration from East Asian economies, including Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and China, which developed sophisticated technology industries despite constraints involving resources, population density and economic development. He recalled how Chinese engineers visiting Zoho's Chennai operations around 25 years ago were perceived by their Indian counterparts as coming from a poorer country.

"Nobody would say this today," he said, pointing to China's subsequent transformation into a major technology power.

At the heart of Vembu's argument was a distinction between developing technology for others and owning the intellectual property that generates long-term economic value. India, he said, performs a significant share of the engineering work for some of the world's largest technology companies but does not capture a proportionate share of the resulting profits.

Vembu claimed that approximately 40–50% of NVIDIA's chip design work, including substantial verification work, happens in India. He also pointed to the significant software development undertaken in the country for Microsoft, Oracle and Cisco.

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