Author(s) :

Zhiyan Ye.

Volume/Issue :

Abstract :

As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly integrated into manufacturing, digital platforms, business services, and industrial applications, the conventional characterization of global specialization as “Made in China and Coded in India” warrants reconsideration. Although this phrase captures important differences in comparative advantage, it provides an incomplete account of the technological and organizational capabilities accumulated in the two countries. From the perspective of dynamic industrial capabilities, this paper argues that the two countries have developed different information technology (IT) capability structures. India has developed strong human-capital- and service-oriented IT capabilities, whereas China has accumulated a more domestically embedded combination of platform, infrastructure, systems-integration, and manufacturing-linked digital capabilities. These differences may condition how talent, data, research investment, computing resources, and organizational capabilities are converted into AI research, models, products, services, and industrial applications. India’s historically weaker linkages among export-oriented IT services, proprietary product development, and domestic industrial applications may constitute a capability-conversion constraint. China’s platform- and manufacturinglinked structure appears to provide more channels for model development and industrial deployment. However, patent and model counts capture only selected dimensions of capability, the literature reviewed is necessarily selective, and the evidence does not establish direct causality. The comparison suggests that global competitiveness in AI and other emerging industries depends not only on current comparative advantage, but also on economies’ ability to recombine accumulated technological, organizational, and industrial capabilities.