Category: Success Stories

Leaders savvy and unsavvy, freelance techie gunslingers who do saffron in the morning and socialism by night, the smell of virtual cordite… India is seeing its first online-only elections. What do the Digital War Rooms of parties look like? On January 8, the Election Commission of India, while announcing a seven-phased voting calendar for the poll-bound states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Goa, Manipur and Uttarakhand, made a parallel ruling that changes the complexion of these assembly elections. No physical rallies and roadshows will be allowed till January 15. The Omicron…

Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, Union Minister of Electronics & Information Technology, launched Phase II of Visvesvaraya PhD Scheme to promote research in 42 emerging technologies in Electronics System Design & Manufacturing (ESDM) and Information Technology (IT)/ Information Technology Enabled Services(ITES) virtually here today.   Dedicating the scheme to Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi on his birthday, Shri Vaishnaw, said that the scheme is manifestation of Prime Minister’s vision of providing world class education and opportunities for research and development to the students at the bottom of the pyramid in society. This scheme…

Asoke K Laha, President & CEO of Interra Information Technologies     The other day I was asked to give a presentation to a gathering on how to lead a corporate entity during uncertain times. When I thought over the subject, many ideas struck me. Should I build the template of the presentation keeping the Covid-19 pandemic in the background and how corporates have modulated their messages to the employees and other stakeholders? Finally, I made up my mind to lace my presentation with hard facts and yet give the…

Asoke K Laha, President & CEO of Interra Information Technologies   A report published by India’s NITI Aayog estimates that India’s ICT sector would touch a turnover of one trillion dollars by 2025 and would become a major plank of the business sector contributing to 20% of the GDP. A McKinsey report, which was released recently also endorsed that view.  Like in any other case, there are skeptics and votaries of the estimates. Skeptics say that to reach that figure for the digital economy, ICT segment which consists of software, electronics hardware and…

Every year, at the cusp of the year ending and beginning of the year ahead, I used to ponder what would be the most likely trend in information technology. In the earlier years, I used to bet on unraveling of block chain, Artificial Intelligence, hyper automation, distributed cloud computing, data mining and a host of other things that can be referred as mega trends in the digital landscape to take the technology to the next level. With the passage of time, my “wish lists” have not only become realties but…

Analysts say that there is a significant correlation between use of technology by masses and overall development of a country. In other words, countries that have more people using technologies and modern devices, may have an edge over nations which have failed to “massify” them. This may be just a hypothesis or conundrum, which has to be proved with clear cut empirical evidences.   Personally speaking, I am bit skeptical about that conclusion. It does not mean that I totally reject that finding. My only point of view is that…

The letter “T” is used now more often than ever before. Let me share my reasoning. Yes, I had deduced my hypothesis from Trump and Tariff, as both start with the letter “T”. As if to prove my reasoning, the other day President in his inimitable style proclaimed through his one-liner tweat “Trump stands for Tariff”.   Let me come to the point: the significance of Trump and Tariff, the ubiquitous pair of Ts. To put in correct perspective, the United States had accumulated a significant large trade deficit in…

I had a strange dream the other day. It was all about internet going off for a few days. I thought of everything that is possibly dependent on the internet to function. I thought about several things including how I would survive as a “netpreneur”, a euphemism for a net entrepreneur. Friends, we are now living in the exciting world of wired society, and every step and movement is decided by the digital platforms. That is slowly becoming a reality for all and not necessarily those in the higher echelons…

If e-commerce is a barometer to measure the penetration of internet in a country, one can assume that India is in its fast pace towards a fully-wired and online society. E-commerce is growing by leaps and bounds. Whether it is real or hyped-up is something that analysts can foretell. A few illustrative descriptions may be relevant in this regard. The foremost is about the war between two American e-commerce companies – Amazon India and Walmart for supremacy in the Indian market. Amazon might have established its Indian subsidiary before Walmart.…