This is the first in a three-part series on what serious India entry actually requires. Part Two covers establishing manufacturing operations. Part Three covers breaking through the wall for companies already in the market.
This article is for general information purposes only and does not constitute legal, business or investment advice. Readers should consult their own professional advisors before acting on any of the information discussed.
I qualified at Cambridge in law in 1988 and have practised since the early 1990s as both an English solicitor and an Israeli lawyer, advising technology clients on cross-border transactions across the United States, England, India, China, Latin America and Africa. India has been a meaningful part of that work since the mid-1990s — I have acted on a major Indian acquisition of an Israeli water technology company, the establishment of Cyient’s Israeli subsidiary, the sale of a US aerospace client’s Israeli subsidiary to an Indian purchaser, and the sale of a leading Israeli defence group to private equity including its Indian operating arm. Two years ago I formalised a partnership with Shepha, the India market entry and business development firm, and what follows draws on both that partnership and three decades of cross-border work before it.
When Prime Minister Modi addressed the Knesset in late February and elevated the India-Israel relationship to a Special Strategic Partnership, my inbox filled up in a way I hadn’t seen in a decade. Israeli, American and European founders who had been vaguely curious about India suddenly wanted to talk seriously. The Modi visit — which I wrote about for Crosswinds Daily https://crosswindsdaily.com/2026/04/08/modi-in-jerusalem-the-key-sectors-in-india-and-israel-that-stand-to-win-big/ — was the biggest catalyst for inbound India interest I’ve experienced since joining Shepha.
The honest response to that inbound flow is uncomfortable. A significant proportion of those conversations will never convert into actual India operations. Not because the companies aren’t good. Not because India isn’t the right market. They will fall at the intersection of expectation and reality — and nowhere is that gap wider than in the first phase of India entry: market research.
The desk-research trap
The single most common mistake foreign companies make when approaching India is treating market research as a desk exercise. They read reports, attend webinars, have a few video calls with contacts-of-contacts, and conclude they understand the landscape. They do not.
India’s market structure, competitive dynamics, regulatory environment, and buyer behaviour vary so dramatically across sectors and regions that research conducted from London, Tel Aviv or New York is almost always misleading in ways that only become apparent once real money is committed. The healthcare market in Maharashtra bears almost no resemblance to the healthcare market in Tamil Nadu. The procurement culture of a large Indian public-sector enterprise is a different world from a Bangalore-based SaaS buyer. The regulatory pathway for a water technology company is nothing like the regulatory pathway for a cybersecurity firm. Desk research flattens all of this into a single “India” that does not actually exist.
This is not a criticism of the founders who rely on desk research. It is a structural problem. Most of what is publicly available about the Indian market — the analyst reports, the trade publications, the government-published statistics — describes India at a level of abstraction that is useful for deciding whether to be interested but actively dangerous as a basis for making commitments. The gap between “India looks like a promising market for our product” and “we understand specifically where, how, and to whom we should sell in India” is enormous, and it can only be bridged by primary research conducted on the ground.
Research first, connections second
At Shepha, every engagement begins with a bespoke tailor-made in-house market research conducted on the ground in India, by the team that will later manage the client relationship. This is not outsourced. It is not desk research supplemented by a few local calls. It is primary research — meetings, site visits, regulatory mapping, competitive analysis — done by people who live and work in India and who understand the difference between what Indian counterparts say in a polite introductory meeting and what they actually mean.
Only once that research is complete does Shepha deploy its network of connections to make introductions and the research is used to structure the commercial model and strategy that will be deployed. The sequence matters: research first, commercial model second, connections third. Reversing it is how most India-entry engagements produce meetings that go nowhere. A well-connected advisor who introduces you to the wrong people in the wrong region for the wrong reasons has not helped you. They have wasted your time and, worse, created a first impression in the market that is difficult to undo.
The right sequence produces a fundamentally different outcome. When the first meeting with a potential Indian partner or customer happens after three months of ground-level research, the conversation is specific, informed, and productive. The foreign company knows what the Indian counterpart actually needs rather than what they assumed they need. The Indian counterpart recognises that the foreign company has done its homework, which in Indian business culture is itself a signal of seriousness that opens doors that would otherwise remain closed.
What “India-ready” actually looks like for market entry
Looking back across the companies I’ve brought through Shepha’s door in two years, the ones who have made genuine progress in the market entry phase share a few characteristics that I didn’t fully appreciate when I started.
Someone senior internally owns the India effort. The companies who progress have a specific senior person whose job includes India. The companies who stall are the ones where India is a side project a busy founder picks up between everything else. India will not reward part-time attention. It punishes it.
Realistic expectations on timeline. Meaningful revenue is 12-18 months away and the first 6-9 months will look like nothing is happening. The companies who quit are the ones who expected a North American sales cycle and got frustrated when India didn’t behave like Texas.
Patience with the relationship phase. India’s enterprise buying culture is relationship-led in ways that Western founders consistently underestimate. The 12-18 month timeline is not because Indians are slow. It is because the first six months are building trust, the next six are navigating internal procurement, and the final three are closing the deal that those twelve months of groundwork made possible.
Commitment before approach. The single biggest predictor of success is whether the decision to be in India has been made internally before the external advisor is engaged. Advisors cannot manufacture commitment on a client’s behalf. What we can do is accelerate the work of companies that have already decided.
Next in this series: Part Two — Why Manufacturing in India Is the Corridor’s Biggest Opportunity, and How to Get It Right
David Cohen is the editor of Crosswinds Daily and Head of Global BizDev at Shepha. He qualified at Cambridge in 1988 and has practised as both an English solicitor and Israeli lawyer for over thirty years. He is fluent in English, Hebrew, Spanish, French, Italian and Russian. Inbound enquiries about India entry can be directed through crosswindsdaily.com/contact or via LinkedIn.
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