Indian Entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley: The Making of a Transnati ...

The unique setting of the region and the development of its techno-entrepreneurial community allows us to understand how skilled, technically qualified immigrants, Indians among them, were welcomed into the region and able to find a footing, at first, as a highly educated workforce and, increasingly, as immigrant Entrepreneurs.

The ability of members of ethnic minority groups to become entrepreneurial in a hi-tech setting is not insignificant. Traditionally, immigrants occupy niches that natives reject—exemplified by the high preponder-ance of immigrant-owned ethnic restaurants, gas stations, grocery stores, and other similar small-scale service-oriented businesses. Silicon Valley immigrant entrepreneurs do not follow this pattern—as they are neither in lowskilled, low-capitalintensive segments of the market, nor are they in niches wherein natives do not compete.

Nor is Silicon Valley akin to traditional immigrant spaces like Chinatown or Little India, where immigrants cloister themselves away from the larger environment in which they live. In the latter self-secluded spaces, self-employment practices are geared primarily toward catering to an ethnic clientele; establishing businesses in Silicon Valley, on the contrary, requires engagement with mainstream society. Indian immigrants in Silicon Valley not only inhabit the same space as their native counterparts, but also strongly identify with the ethic and spirit of entrepreneurship found throughout the region. Thus, a historical analysis will delineate the “making” of Silicon Valley as a starting point to grasp the seeds from which immigrants, Indians among them, were able to sow their entrepreneurial spirit.

Within a short span of half a century, this region in Northern California transformed itself from one primarily engaged in agricultural activity into the foremost center of global hi-tech productivity.