Adversity + Diversity = Innovation
NASSCOM India Leadership Forum 2008 held in Mumbai between February 13 and 15 was a pot pourri of ideas powered by ‘cutting’ chai.
By Anoop K Menon & Jamsheed Gandhi
 Guess the favorite meeting point at Nasscom India Leadership Forum 2008? At the masala tea counters, lifted right out of Mumbai streets, serving freshly brewed ‘cutting’ chai with a hint of ginger in soda glass tumblers. Client meetings, relationship building exercises, interviews and even good old gossip could be gleaned by simply hanging around these counters. The forum saw the usual mix of IT honchos, foreign delegations from as far as Costa Rica, a few politicians as well as global executives intermingling with local entrepreneurs, investment bankers trying to line up their next target, placement agencies trying to poach for their clients, etc.
Over three days, people met, exchanged thoughts and networked socially over scrumptious meals. There was the band of usual suspects that we have been so used to seeing over the years and who have been credited with the creation and sustenance of the software industry in the country.
But, what is evident is that the entire industry is looking at Europe over the US to drive outsourcing growth over the next few years. As one of the presenters pointed out “In 2007, the value of outsourcing contracts from Europe exceeded those from the US” - something the audience took to heart.
Local companies will need to look at delivering a complete solution to its partners if it wants to grow the industry from the current $30 billion to touch $100 billion over the next few years.
There was a high level of participation from business development councils representing Costa Rica, Nova Scotia, Ireland & Wales, and China.
Informed Irving Soto, Director of Investment Promotion, Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency, “We have come to India for the second time and are looking at inviting companies to set-up their operations in Costa Rica.” With his predominantly speaking Spanish country located in the same time zone as that of the United States of America, Soto feels Costa Rica would be a good place for Indian companies to set up shop, and also target the Spanish speaking population in the US.
With a the low cost of operation, and tax benefits to companies, Costa Rica could emerge as an attractive location to cater to the Spanish speaking US consumer base. Companies can avail of 100 percent tax benefits if their operations are located in a Free Trade Zone, which can be made with a minimum investment of $150,000 over a period of one year.
Showcasing their development activities at the event was Bangalore-based Telibrahma, which created an event information application for the BlackBerry. Users could download the application and keep up to date with the various tracks over the three days; they could network with other participant and use it as a location guide. Also included was a contest and a sponsors list.
“We started up in 2004 and initially in order to survive, used to license out our components to other companies. Now we have come out with our own hosted applications that deliver context sensitive marketing and a hosted enterprise logistics solution,” said Suresh Narasimha, CEO, Telibrahma.
The company has executed solutions for a Germany-based courier company and has deployed a solution for the Karnataka Police. This solution entails empowering the police officers with a blackberry, which will be tied into their applications and used to track and maintain a record of fines issued to drivers. “We will be including a small non-branded printer as part of the solutions, as when the officer will input the car details and the amount fined, it will get logged in a central database, and simultaneously the fine receipt will be printed on the spot,” informs Narasimha. The Blackberry and the printer will be wirelessly connected together via Bluetooth. The company is one of the few to be featured in the Red Herring Global 100 Awards for 2007.
New Delhi-based NIIT Technologies used the NASSCOM platform to announce its Software as a Service (SaaS) offering. Branded as ProcureEasy, this solution will initially target the procurement function, and will later, add on to it parallel processes such as HR and Sales. The company has allied with India-based Data Centers as well as key software vendors for this initiative, which is expected to bring in revenues of about Rs 10 crore.
Rajendra Pawar, Chairman, and Arvind Mehrotra, Senior VP & Head–APAC & India, NIIT Technologies informed us - “We now are capable of deploying a flexible solution to companies without them incurring huge capital expenditure. This keeps their cost to a minimum while allowing them a full fledged solution, which will be priced either as a subscription or transaction based.”
They point out that organizations are increasingly looking at their IT functions from an operating expenditure rather than as a capital expenditure, which is pushing the case of Software as a Service model.
They feel that the market for software on demand is growing exponentially and India is slated to be the fastest growing geographical location. NIIT will be the single point contact for clients and will manage the back end services that go into running such an application.
Driving home the fact that IT companies need to look beyond themselves as outsourced partners, and need to become part of their clients strategic vision and business practices was Anil Laud, Managing Director, Siemens Information Systems who feels that innovative ideas will drive in bringing Indian IT companies closer to their customers. “No one wants vanilla offerings. Earlier cost was a factor, but now it is innovation. If partners tell customers honestly the derived benefits of the solution, then there will not be any need to hardsell.”
On our interaction with participants, a few key technology trends have been identified that will impact markets in the coming year. This was well illustrated by Bruce Richardson, Chief Research Officer at AMR Research.
Highlighting the impact that a 3-dimentional Internet presence will have in the future was David Levin, CEO, United Business Media, whose company has developed such presences for Infinion, Sun, Microsoft and Symantec. He remarked, “While face-to-face meetings will never be replaced completely, companies are gaining benefits from offering a virtual alternative, which could be for training, product information, employee meetings or even holding events.”
The Temple of the Sun, a game developed for Sun Microsystems by UBM, was access by over 250,000 people. It required contestants to make their way through a temple while avoiding obstacles and pitfalls, gathering jewels and collecting points which ultimately unleash the power of the Sun from the temple.
After playing the first five levels, contestants need to register their details in a form, which must be submitted to advance to the sixth and final level. Once the form is submitted, the contestants will need to use the Sun Studio software in order to continue to play the game. This is a prime example of how a game helps drive product acceptability.
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