In Dialogues@IIT
In Dialogues@IIT
In Dialogues@IIT
SOUMITRA
DUTTA
Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology, INSEAD and Dean Designate, Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management Cornell University
Curated by theIdeaWorks, a design and strategy firm headquartered in Delhi, the campus module of InDialogues: Conversations with the World made its India debut at IIT Delhi on Sunday, March 4, 2012.
Two eminent speakers, Soumitra Dutta, Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD, France and Dean Designate of Cornell Universitys Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, and also an alumnus of IIT Delhi; and Wilfried Aulbur, Managing Partner , Roland Berger Strategy Consultants, India fired the imagination of young students on how to leverage their talent and education to co-create a more inclusive and better India.
WILFRIED
AULBUR
Managing Partner in India Roland Berger Strategy Consultants
Soumitra Dutta set the tone for the session, speaking on Innovation and Entrepreneurship in a Globalised World. He highlighted two prompts for innovation: technological push, where new technologies create whole new industries, and market pull, where existing technologies are cleverly combined to create viable market solutions. Dutta argued that in order to maintain ground on the global stage, India should increase investment in original research, development, and production of new technologies. He recalled traveling to California in 1985 and being asked Hey, did you go to school in a bullock cart?. India was overwhelmingly associated with cows in the street, abject poverty, and snake charmers. In more recent years, common questions from foreigners have changed to, Are you a software programmer? and Is everyone in India as bright as you are? India is now perceived as a country of high technology and very bright people. Dutta stressed that graduating students today are incredibly lucky and privileged. Higher expectations from the outside put on a healthy pressure, challenging students to perform better. He talked about the evolution of technology from his days as a student, when programming was done on punching cards. Mobile phones have become dramatically widespread across world, with over 5 billion used amongst a population of 7 billion people. Technology has become democratic. It has become free. It is the great liberator. Technology affords a sense of control on destiny, on work environment, and on life in very fundamental ways. From hawkers on the street to domestic help in households, technology has become an essential tool for efficiency of time and resources, and a key element of empowerment. For students, technology is enabling dreams to be fulfilled. Visions, goals and ideas about how to change the world can actually be implemented today, with minimal capital and infrastructure. All you need is an active mind. Dutta mentioned that Mark Zuckenbergs success was not built on significant monetary investment, but rather passion and commitment. He urged todays students to aspire to surpass Zuckerberg in his accomplishments, with a healthy sense of competition that will move the world forward. The global online space shifting to the East as more and more people in Asia come online: the average penetration of the internet in Asia is 25%, while in the West it is 78%. While Europe and America have pretty much reached saturation, the amount of additional penetration possible in Asia is significant. There is an immense possibility for innovation.
Wilfried Aulbur in his talk on The Future of Automotive Engineering 2025, stressed upon the need for automotive engineering to cope with five main challenges in the coming years: higher regional complexity; higher product complexity; higher technology complexity; cost optimisation and a war for talent. Among other changes, businesses will need to adapt from having a global presence to being globally integrated. Finally, highly effective operating models must be designed to manage the transformation into a more agile, flexible, and efficient engineering organization. He stressed the importance of globally networked, decentralized Research and Development. As the world becomes more complex, there is a tremendous opportunity for young engineers in India to truly innovate and to create brand new markets that can be translated globally. He deliberated upon the different ways in which companies organize themselves. The quality of hierarchical organization in india might look very different than in Sweden, in terms of roles and responsibility, and common goals and vision. Beyond R&D, the way forward is through more networked structures that can cope with the complexities of the workplace today. Decentralized organizations are also closer to their customer, they understand the customer and will have greater success in sales. He noted that in the years to come the emphasis would shift to structures that are more and more networked, less and less hierarchical. In this scenario, social skills and interactions become very important for long-term success. The ability to perform and operate in this less structured environment is not based on having a tech degree, but rather on how the degree is leveraged. Mr. Aulbur then focused on the state of Engineering education today, stressing that the percentage of female engineers in India is very disappointing. Designed as a forum to stimulate open dialogue, InDialogues at IIT Delhi, saw students address a wide range of questions to the speakers, in a Q&A session moderated by Ravina Raj Kohli of JobCorp. From the significance of liberal arts in education to the challenge of reconciling unemployment and efficiency ; from comparisons between India and China to the issue of brain drain; from creating locally ingenious solutions that can be translated globally to entrepreneurship, the speakers and students remained engaged in a meaningful discussion on leveraging Indias unique position in the global context. The message that rang clear was that change will be the only constant. We have before us a global construct where chaos will be a given, where innovation will drive the markets and where a model for sustainability will have to come out of shared visions and goals.
About the speakers Soumitra Dutta is the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology at INSEAD and the founding director of INSEAD eLab, a center of excellence in the digital economy. From 1 July 2012, he will join the Samuel Curtis Graduate School of Management at Cornell University as its 11th Dean. Professor Dutta obtained his Ph.D. in computer science and his M.Sc. in business administration from the University of California at Berkeley. His current research is on technology strategy and innovation at both corporate and national policy levels. He has won several awards for research and pedagogy and is actively involved in policy development at national and European levels. His research has been showcased in the international media and he has taught in and consulted with international corporations. Dr. Wilfried Aulbur did his doctoral and post- doctoral studies in physics in Europe and the US. With a keen interest in the business of automobiles, Aulbur has been a force in the Indian luxury car market. Before 2000, he held at Airbus, Germany and at the Daimler Headquarters. He was also working in the US at the Chrysler Corporation . After this, between 2000 and 2002, he headed the Business Development and Strategy function at the Mercedes Benz Research & Development Centre in Bangalore, India. In 2003, he became the Executive Assistant of the Head of Mercedes Car Group, providing support in different operational and strategic initiatives within the global Mercedes group. From 2006 till 2010, he was the Managing Director and CEO of Mercedes-Benz India where he was responsible for the production, sales and after sales of Mercedes-Benz passenger cars, buses and trucks. Presently Aulbur is working as Managing partner in Mumbai for Roland Berger, a global strategy consulting firm.
...When you come to the business world, its not where you have graduated from, but what you bring to the table...
RAVINA RAJ KOHLI
...You (students) are lucky not only because of your education and age, but because people expect you to perform better and to challenge yourself....
SOUMITRA DUTTA
...a globally networked environment may not be available to you right now, but in the future we will need it...
WILFRED AULBER
The world is changing, minds are changing, how do we feel pulse of the market? A lot of bright people from India are going outside, few people are coming in. Isnt it better we stay here and fight for developments, make the country proud and develop at the same time? How do we make sure were not just the market, but also actor of exchange?
INDIA Future of Change is a unique public-private partnership in nation branding launched in 2010, by theIdeaWorks with the support of Public Diplomacy Division, Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. It features a series of global contests on India-centred themes targeting students across the best campuses worldwide, a platform for exchange of ideas and an outreach programme to engage young professionals and entrepreneurs in the India narrative. The initiative has won wide appreciation amongst multiple communities of stakeholders and is now seeking corporate support in India and overseas to achieve the desired scale and reach.
INDIA Future of Change is a unique public-private partnership in nation branding launched in 2010, by theIdeaWorks with the support of Public Diplomacy Division, Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. It features a series of global contests on India-centred themes targeting students across the best campuses worldwide, a platform for exchange of ideas and an outreach programme to engage young professionals and entrepreneurs in the India narrative. The initiative has won wide appreciation amongst multiple communities of stakeholders and is now seeking corporate support in India and overseas to achieve the desired scale and reach. www.indiafutureofchange.com
No part of this document and information about the January 26 session may be published in print or electronic media without giving due credit to theIdeaWorks, INDIA Future of Change and InDialogues.
For more information about theIdeaWorks, INDIA Future of Change or InDialogues, and to organise an InDialogues session in your campus, you could contact us at amit@theideaworks.in or horo@theideaworks.in
InDialogues: Conversations with the World is a platform to bring together thought leaders and domain experts to focus on challenges that India shares with large parts of the emerging world; and attempt devising solutions that can have wider applicability and acceptance. The first InDialogue session was held in Delhi in November 2011. On January 26, 2012, InDialogues made its Davos debut with an interactive session on Design & Innovation: Enablers of Indias Urban Future. Over the coming months, InDialogues will travel across campuses in India and overseas, touching upon contemporary themes relevant to India and the world. www.indialogues.in