The quiet deal fueling India’s rise and America’s decline

In August 2024, the U.S. Small Business Administration signed a five-year agreement with the government of India to promote Indian small- and medium-sized enterprises in the global marketplace. Framed as a knowledge-sharing partnership, the deal includes digital matchmaking tools, joint programs on access to capital and shared training on export finance, green technology and women-owned entrepreneurship.

Diverging narratives: India’s ambitions vs. U.S. indifference

Despite being presented as a “landmark” agreement by the Small Business Administration, the U.S.-India MSME Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) received virtually no coverage in major American media outlets. It was not reported by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, or major networks such as CNN or Fox News. Most mentions came from Indian outlets, industry blogs, or government press releases.

This absence of domestic attention raises serious questions about how much priority the U.S. government and media actually place on a deal that claims to advance American small-business interests.

The only notable U.S. commentary came from a blog post by the SMB Center, which bluntly assessed the agreement’s relevance for American entrepreneurs: “In reality, for most small business owners in the U.S., this agreement won’t have much of an impact on your day-to-day operations or immediate business prospects. … It largely means nothing for the average small business owner.”

The India media, however, highlighted how this new agreement will address issues related to India’s MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises), including provisions to exchange expertise that will improve MSME participation in the global market, access to trade and export finance, technology, digital trade, green economy and trade facilitation.

This contrast in media coverage underscores a troubling gap: While India sees strategic gain and has deployed national resources to capitalize on the MoU, the U.S. has not mobilized its small business community or mainstream media to do the same, leaving American entrepreneurs in the dark while a foreign government positions itself to benefit.

What seems to be additionally concerning is that the five-year agreement did not appear in President Trump’s U.S. Trade Representative’s 2025 Trade Policy Agenda and Annual Report, while other similar SBA agreements for other countries did.

Opening American systems to foreign service providers

The agreement gives Indian firms direct access to U.S. companies and service providers through a government-backed “business matching digital platform,” along with programming on trade finance, commercialization and digital technologies, all supported by the U.S. Small Business Administration.

Critically, the SBA agreement makes no distinction between high-value, innovation-driven startups and low-cost outsourcing firms. It imposes no requirement for participating foreign entities to comply with U.S. labor standards, employment protections, or tax obligations.

It also fails to acknowledge that many of these Indian small- and medium-sized enterprises often operate as outsourcing vendors, offering services such as customer support, IT maintenance, accounting and administrative operations, roles that have long been offshored to the detriment of American workers. According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, American companies spent over $36 billion on imported business services from India in 2023.

Technology and intellectual-property risks remain unaddressed

The SBA agreement further opens the door to joint programming around technology, digital trade and innovation without any clear guardrails for data protection, commercial confidentiality, or export controls. India’s Ministry of MSMEs actively manages programs that fund domestic startups to commercialize technologies, many of which are developed through international partnerships with foreign firms.

At the same time, India remains on the United States Trade Representative’s Priority Watch List for systemic failures in intellectual-property enforcement. The USTR has cited “high rates of counterfeiting and trade secret theft,” among other issues including a lack of adequate protections for U.S. innovators and investors.

Despite these unresolved concerns, the August 2024 SBA agreement creates new, direct pathways for Indian firms to access U.S. companies, innovation hubs and federal small business resources, particularly in high-growth sectors like green energy and digital infrastructure.

American small businesses, many built on proprietary technologies and unique workflows, are now expected to share space in SBA-facilitated engagements without any assurance their innovations won’t be reverse-engineered or replicated abroad.

This raises a critical question: Does the SBA agreement provide India’s MSMEs with the very access the USTR has consistently withheld? And in doing so, has the U.S. government created a backdoor for India to bypass trade enforcement mechanisms meant to protect American technology and innovation?

Record U.S. closures as foreign partnerships grow

While the SBA was expanding trade access for India, American small businesses were closing in record numbers back home.

In 2024 alone, the U.S. Small Business Administration reported more than 600,000 American small business closures. According to the latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. retailers announced over 7,100 store closures, a staggering 69% increase from the previous year.

The wave of shutdowns hit both major chains like CVS, Walgreens, and 99 Cents Only, as well as thousands of small, independently owned shops across the country.

Rising inflation, supply chain disruptions and tighter capital markets pushed many small enterprises out of business. The odds remain grim as nearly 1 in 5 small businesses fail within their first year and by year five, nearly half have shut down.

Yet even in the face of this crisis, the SBA appears to have shifted its focus away from its core mission of supporting American small businesses. Instead, its international engagement strategy prioritizes deeper integration with India’s export infrastructure, leaving struggling U.S. entrepreneurs behind.

Meanwhile, across the globe, India is celebrating the results. In a government press release titled “2025-26: Fueling MSME Expansion – Credit access, digitisation, and business-friendly reforms lead the way,” India’s Ministry of MSME reports that contributions from Indian micro, small and medium enterprises have tripled between 2021 and 2024–2025.

The contrast couldn’t be clearer: As American small businesses shutter under economic pressure, the U.S. government is helping fuel India’s MSME boom, opening U.S. markets, sharing resources and forging partnerships that offer little in return for the American worker.

One agency, two outcomes

For small businesses in the United States, 2024 brought thousands of closures, record debt burdens and tighter access to capital. Even firms approved for SBA loans reported delays or funding gaps too large to survive.

Yet while domestic businesses face mounting pressure, the SBA formalized a multi-year agreement that promotes the international expansion of a foreign small-business sector, one that is already displacing U.S. labor, absorbing global investment and operating under rules that shield it from the obligations American firms must meet.

The SBA’s partnership with India does not include a mechanism to measure or limit job displacement. It does not restrict foreign participation based on trade compliance or intellecutal-property risk. And it does not ensure any tangible benefit to the struggling small businesses across America the agency was created to serve.

As India celebrates a new era of economic dominance, America’s small businesses are left behind, underfunded, underprotected and outmatched by a foreign system our own government is helping to build.

Follow Amanda Bartolotta at WND for more exclusive reports uncovering the immigration industrial complex and the foreign takeover of American innovation.