Talk by Dr. Sangeeta Pandit at the CII event in association with SIMSREE -‘Start Up India, Stand Up India' Live Streaming

Talk by Dr. Sangeeta Pandit, Prof. & HOD Finance, at the Confederation of Indian Industry ( CII ) event in association with SIMSREE -‘Start Up India, Stand Up India – Enablers and way ahead’ on Saturday, 16 January 2016.

Dr. Sangeeta Pandit

Prof. & HOD Finance

Good Evening everyone! Warm welcome to esteemed panelists, CII representatives, honorable Director Sir, faculty colleagues, representatives of other colleges and my dear students. We are all gathered here today to deliberate, discuss and hear from entrepreneurs themselves about entrepreneurship. We are then going to hear our Prime Minister’s address launching the Start Up campaign.

India is one of the leading Start Up Hubs of the World with over 3100 mostly tech start ups in 2014-15. However our investments are not adequate and also most of it is from overseas. Our government has decided to help accelerate Start ups. Governments of Brazil and Korea invest heavily in Start ups. Our Start ups cannot ape the Silicon valley, we need to leverage our humongous population and build an ecosystem conducive to our environment and culture. We have the benefit of large number of young population, high mobile penetration, large number of internet users and untapped e commerce markets. We hear about successful start ups becoming global entities but many also have an early untimely death. We have to tread firmly but with caution. Proper mentoring and vigorous risk analysis is needed. Government can boost financial resource availability, technology and mentors can be identified but the main stakeholder of entrepreneurs have to be created, they are a creed by themselves, creative, hardworking, risk takers who walk new paths. Our education system needs to factor in subjects that will kindle and foster entrepreneurial skills.

Magazine-Business Today reported in their December issue about 10 Start ups in India which have grown big. Amongst them were Start ups in E-Learning, helping recruiters in filtering applications for IT jobs, E marketing, digital video content making and so on.

One must understand ones skill sets and core competencies, match it with market opportunities and in this frame work zero down on an idea. Rest is all about leadership skills, implementation and prudence.

If all want to be employees, employers are bound to fall short. The country needs entrepreneurs and today I think we are making history by taking a small step towards it.

Thank You.        

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HR Conclave'15 - Shaping Tomorrow's Leaders

The Corporate Relations Committee of SIMSREE organized its 1^st major event of the new academic year, HR conclave on 10^th September 2015 to discuss various aspects of leadership and its effect on organizations. The HR conclave is an annual event where HR heads of reputed companies assemble at SIMSREE to express their views on a topic that has relevance to the current market scenario. The topic for this year’s HR conclave was “Shaping Tomorrow’s Leaders: Learning from the past”. The guests that graced the college campus for this event were: Mr. C Srinivasulu (Vice President - HR, Lupin Limited), Mr. Atul Joshi (Head HR (Automotive Division), Mahindra & Mahindra), Ms. Meena Jagtiani (HR Advisor - Projects, Group Human Resources, Aditya Birla Management Corporation Pvt. Ltd), Ms. Diptii Das (Head HR - South Asia, Aramex International) and Mr. Srinivas Chunduru (Chief Human Resources Officer at the Piramal Group). 

                           

(From Left to Right :  Mr. C Srinivasulu, Mr. Atul Joshi, Ms. Meena Jagtiani, Ms. Diptii Das, Mr. Srinivas Chunduru)

The panel discussion was moderated by Ms. Jagtiani who gave a brief introduction of the topic to the students. After the introduction, the discussion was started by Mr. Srinivasulu who being a home-grown leader himself, shared his thoughts on how a company can groom its employees through succession planning and leadership identification processes by giving an example of Sundar Pichai. The discussion was followed by Mr. Joshi who gave an insight to the new trend of Gen-Y leaders. Ms. Das who spoke next, made the atmosphere lively with her highly energetic talk on the current volatile world and how a leader who has a hybrid portfolio is best suited for this environment. Mr. Chunduru stressed upon the importance of values like integrity and humility which are essential for any leader in today’s world. The discussion was then concluded by Ms. Jagtiani by expressing her views on the trends of future, loyalty and leaders.

The crux of the discussion was whether a company needs a home-grown leader to tackle the challenges arising due to a global and complex environment or a lateral hire who has a vast experience across industries and organizations. The panel unanimously acknowledged that the most significant thing that mattered while electing a leader were his/her innate qualities like humility, general management skills, professional competence etc. though both company loyalists and laterals had a few distinct advantages which made them more suitable than the other in a few instances. The other part of the discussion was on the challenges faced by women leaders in the industry and ways to overcome it. 

                                 

The discussion was followed by a Q&A round for 30 minutes. It was a great and insightful session for the first year students. “The various facets of leadership became very clear to us” quoted one of the students.  They also got a chance to understand the expectations and qualities that organizations look for in a leader which is a vital part of corporate life.

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CONFLUENCE '15 - Annual Consulting Conclave by SIMCON

SIMCON-SIMSREE Consulting Club organised its Annual Consulting Conclave, Confluence on the 8^th of February, 2015. The event is in its third year. SIMCON has succeeded over the years in building strong and beneficial relations with corporates. The event is aimed at bringing management students and the corporate world together to generate insights into current happenings in the industry. Based on the theme “India -A Gateway for Global firms”, Confluence ’15 aimed at focusing upon the industry requirements and steps the government can take to ensure progress for the country.

The event began with the Welcome Note by Director of SIMSREE, Dr. Sandhya Dhabe. She introduced the theme for the event & highlighted the significance of relevance of the theme in present times.

In line with this theme the Chief Guest for the event, Mr.Vivek Kulkarni (Founder & Chairman, Brickworks India) spoke on the topic “Supremacy for India amongst emerging markets”. Mr. Kulkarni highlighted upon various statistics showcasing India as the path ahead for global growth. Even through google trends, India could be seen as being highest searched. Mr.Kulkarni also quoted IMF in saying “India’s economy will overtake China in terms of its annual growth rate by 2016.”

Post the Chief Guest speech, it was time for the first panel discussion. The topic for discussion was “India’s Investment Landscape –The Road Ahead”. The panel discussion consisted of the below panellists:

·        Mr.Girish Vanvari (Partner & Co-Head Tax, KPMG)

·        Mr. Prateek Pant (Executive Director, RBS)

·        Mr. Anant Gupta (Vice President, Kedaara Capital)

·        Mr. Santhi VIjetha (Director, Grant Thornton India)

·       Ms. Mukti Hariharan (Vice President, Credit Suisse) – Moderator

The panel highlighted the policy paralysis along with various other issues plaguing the scope of growth for India presently. Mr. Vanvari highlighted how they need to keep themselves on toes to understand the ever changing laws. He also threw light on the fact that the Companies Act 2014, was actually tabled in 2002, but was passed in its present form in 2014. This showed the policy paralysis prevalent in the governance of the country. The panel touched upon the topics of GAAR, GST and other such policies that prevent multiple investments in India along with how India has the potential to tap into multiple such opportunities with regards to FDI, FII through M&As etc. The discussion revolved around activities that would result in ease of doing business in India like Tax reforms, GST, single window clearance and other such activities. The wariness of the investors in investing in India was cited by examples like the Vodafone Tax case. The conclusion of the discussion was that unless India removes the road blocks, it would not attract huge investments. The first panel answered the queries put forth by the students from various topics such as Tax, GAAR.

The second panel discussion was more related towards how the industry needs to modify itself or suit itself to do business in India. The topic for discussion was “Adapt or Innovate - The Mantra for Survival & Sustained Growth’ from a marketing perspective. The panellist were:

·        Mr. Mohan V ( Former Executive Director/VP, HJ Heinz)

·        Mr. Vinay Gupta (Business Head, VG Retail Consulting)

·        Mr. Sandeep Zutshi (CEO & Co-Founder, Ascentaz Consulting)

·        Mr. Sunit Kishore (Head of Marketing, Novartis)

·        Mr. Joydeep Roy (Member of Governing Council, IIB) – Moderator

Discussion started with Mr. Roy giving a brief about the discussion and handing over the reins to the panellist one by one and keeping a check on the time at the same time. The discussion flowed in a question answer format where the moderator would ask a question in order to structure the discussion. Mr. Zutshi started with different types of innovations that we see in the world today- product, process, communication and technological innovation. Be it the Nirma case or the Balaji wafers case, product innovation is right in your face and hence the most visible. But given this fact, it is the technological innovation which retains imperious benefits and far-fetched benefits giving rise to a host of opportunities. The discussion moved then towards how Indian markets perceive any innovations. The session being an interactive one, the famous question of which of brick and mortar or e-retail industry would dominate in India came out. This was answered in different perspectives with Mr. Vinay Gupta explaining that the market always come to an equilibrium – eventually price would not be the competing factor but service alone would be the deciding factor. Mr. Mohan talked about how innovation is sometimes has to be achieved in the realms of the business and brand. Mr. Mohan talked about how Heinz had taken tougher route of launching ketchup in India; when it first launched its operations here; instead of making local tomato chatni which Indians are already fond of eating.  This is how brands operate in terms of maintaining their legacy along with driving innovations. Mr. Sunit Kishore steered the discussion towards the pharma industry and expressed how innovation is actually an over hyped word in the industry circles and how companies view innovation as just a task to do and hence do it for sake of it. This statement gave a very interesting path to the discussion and everyone started about their experiences of such incidence in their industries.

Overall the session was very interactive with students asking a lot of questions and the panellists and moderator answering them with patience. The students gained a lot of insights from both the panel discussions & from the Chief Guests addressal.

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Marketer’s Mark ‘14

Students of Sydenham Institute of Management Studies, Research and Entrepreneurship Education (SIMSREE) belonging to the Corporate Relations Committee organised “Marketer’s Mark” for the first time ever on 22nd August, 2014. It brought together a few of the marketing world’s stalwarts with its theme being “Rewriting the Rulebook”. The guests included Ms. Deepali Naair (Chief Marketing Officer, Mahindra Holidays & Resort India Ltd.) as Keynote Speaker, Dr. Hemant Dande (President, Raptakos Brett & Co.) as Moderator, Ms. Anjali Patil (Director - Brand and Communications, BNP Paribas), Mr. Ajay Jethi (Chief Marketing Officer, Reliance Capital Asset Management), Mr. Sanjay Vakharia (Director - Marketing, Spykar Lifestyles Pvt. Ltd.), and Mr. Madan Mohapatra (Head - Media & Marketing, Future Group).

The students were introduced to many new marketing concepts like micro segmentation, need for reshaping the customer demand and the importance of personalization amongst many others. Apart from these, through the discussions of the panellists, greater emphasis was laid on adaptability and pace of the current world. The esteemed panellists mutually agreed that everything is evolving continuously as the consumer is changing, becoming more confident and technology dependent. As a result, companies have to innovate to include digital mediums and follow innovative marketing campaigns in order to capture the ever decreasing attention spans of the consumer.

The importance and need for context in marketing was reiterated throughout the conclave focussing on the changing needs, wants and demands of the consumer. Marketing cannot be considered in isolation and must be done with the right context to succeed. 

All the guests were very enthusiastic in sharing their experiences and answering all the students’ questions in detail. Through these discussions, the students gained immense knowledge into the workings of current marketing world, its evolving nature and the latest trends which they would be otherwise hard pressed to find in any textbook, magazine or newspaper in such a lucid manner. This shows the very successful start to Marketer’s Mark becoming an annual event at SIMSREE.

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HR Conclave ‘14

HR Conclave-14, held on 8th August, 2014 was the first event for the academic year 2014-15 for the 2014-16 batch organised by the SIMSREE Corporate Relations Committee, with the topic ‘Mergers & Acquisitions: The HR perspective in managing change’. The panel included eminent personalities from the HR domain such as Dr. Adil Malia (Global Head - Leadership, Learning and People Management, Essar Group) as Keynote Speaker, Ms. Madhavi Lall (former Global Head- Employee Relations, Standard Chartered) as the moderator, Prof. Darryl Cabral (founder, Total Solutions Incorporated), Mr. Sanjeev Parkar (Director - Human Capital at PriceWaterhouseCoopers), Dr. Jayant Kumar (Chief of Business HR, Tata Power) and Mr. Dharam Rakshit (Assistant Vice President-Employee Relations and Compliances at Mondelez Foods).

Mergers and Acquisitions are a route that companies use to achieve success. However, there are various differences present in terms of human capital and cultural differences prevalent between the two companies being merged. The feeling of being a victor and vanquished company tends to prevail amongst the two companies and leads to a major loss of morale in the company being acquired.  

Many a time, the HR is involved in the process only after the finalization of the financials and material MOUs. Such a deal would lead to a future failure in the negotiations. The panel highlighted how one needs to focus on “Realization of company values and integration of various processes across the two companies”, along with integration of work cultures of the companies. The crux of the discussion was that the HR team should be part of the strategy team present in the war room so that all the differences regarding human capital and internal processes are ironed out smoothly and the process of M&A becomes smooth for the blue collared employees along with the white collared employees. 

The panel highlighted various scenarios from their personal experiences regarding M&As so that the students were able to comprehend the importance of HR in the process of M&A. Various intricacies of M&As were revealed during the session, shedding light on the close association between different verticals in a company and how each of these verticals are engaged when a company chooses to acquire another. It was a great session for first year students to get a taste of corporate interactions.

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SIM'ergence 14

SIM’ergence is the annual flagship corporate event of SIMSREE. It is organized by ‘Corporate Relations Committee’ of SIMSREE in association with BSE (Bombay Stock Exchange). With the aim of bringing about an interaction between management students and corporate, the event is being organized successfully from the past one decade. Pragmatically, it’s an annual academia-industry interface, where in, the stalwarts of the Business and Industrial world come together to discuss the issues and scorching questions faced by the various industries and identify what could be the future business trends. Persisting with this trend, SIM’ergence was organized on 14^th March, 2014 at BSE’s International Convention Hall.  Keeping with its tradition of picking up themes that are to contemporary industrial and economic scenario, The theme for SIM’ergence 14 was ‘Turbulent Times: Thriving or Surviving?’

Indian market was recently surrounded by many impediments including depreciation of rupee, rising crude oil prices, low consumer demands, low investor  confidence. Bad loans, lack of infrastructure, weak government at the helm were also adding to the already existing woes. As future managers, these events were very relevant to the management students.  SIM’ergence 14 provided the platform for the students to meet and understand the views of established players from across the industries which would guide them to prepare the necessary strategies when they actually start dealing with the things in their corporate career. This grand event was witnessed by both 1^st & 2^nd year students of SIMSREE, many students and professors from other eminent business schools from Mumbai.

The event was started by the traditional lighting of the lamp along with Saraswati Vandana. Dr. Sandhya Dhabe (Director, SIMSREE) then delivered the welcome note in which she summarized the idea behind the theme of the event. “Today’s economy is going through a bad phase. Even the big organizations are losing their dominance. Little start-ups are struggling big time. So to survive in this situation it is necessary to understand the various strategies and the plans of action by the students (who are managers to be)”, said Dr.  Dhabe.

SIMSREE was honoured to have Mr. M. B. Parekh (Chairman, Pidilite) as the chief guest of SIM’ergence 14. “It is very easy to get distracted by turbulence.  But one should not get distracted by the same. There should be a clear vision to identify the opportunities in the period of turbulence”, Mr. M. B. Parekh said. He elaborated the opportunities conveyed by turbulences by the example of Seagulls catching fishes in turbulences created by a passing boat. “Robust Business Model, Flexibility and Alertness are the three keys for surviving in turbulent times.”, Mr. Parekh concluded. Students were enthralled by his simplicity and pleasant personality.

Mr. Madhukar Sabnavis (Vice Chairman & Country Head (Discovery & Planning), Ogilvy & Mather) was the Guest of Honour at SIM’ergence 14. An ardent cricket fan, Mr Sabnavis quoted examples of two classic test matches to highlight few winning strategies like ‘Playing to the strength’ and ‘Keeping faith in themselves’. Mr. Sabnavis said, “When you hit the turbulence, you will definitely find your way to come out of it.” Apart from this, he gave many examples through the clippings of famous advertisements & movies.

Following this, students witnessed the keynote speaker Mr. Vaidison Krishnamurty (Director, Transaction Services & Private Equity (Mergers & Acquisions), PricewaterhouseCoopers) extending his views on the theme of the event. Through his immense experience in dealing with foreign investors, He explained how all these investors look at India as an investment destination. “Thriving and Surviving are the two ends of the spectrum. Indian economy is lying in the middle.” Mr. Krishnamurty opined. Mr. Krishnamurty expressed his worry about the future situation in India especially on fronts like employment creation, growth of manufacturing sector. He also hailed good legal systems, Government measures like DBT, strong central bank as India’s plus points. 

Icing on the cake was the guidance from Mr. Sanjeev Churiwala (CFO, Ambuja Cements Ltd.), who happened to be the special guest speaker, on the theme of the event. Mr Churiwala elaborated the drastic changes in India since opening up of the economy by quoting figures like GDP, FDI Inflow, exports and Foreign Exchange Reserves of India. Mr Churiwala highlighted burning issues like infrastructure, changing consumer preferences. Concluding on an inspiring note, he guided students by saying, “The exposure, willpower and the clear mindset are the factors that make the brighter MBA students stand out from the entire lot. At the end of the day, it is hard work and stable mind that would prove the potential of the students.”

Panel Discussion -1:-

The speeches were followed by panel discussions. The topic for the first panel discussion was ‘Leveraging Turbulence: The Key to Dominance’. The industry stalwarts participating in this discussion were:-

1.      Mr. Rajiv Bajaj, Associate Director- CS & CFO, Panasonic (Moderator)

2.      Ms. Vibha Padalkar, Executive Director & CFO, HDFC Life

3.      Mr. Sandeep Gokhale, President, JSW Steel Ltd.

4.      Mr. Bharat Sampat, Executive Vice President & CFO, Development Credit Bank

5.      Mr. Sudeep Nair, Global Head (Business Transformation), JLT

6.      Mr. Srinivasan Gopalan, CFO & COO, The Wadhwa Group

Mr. Rajiv Bajaj kicked off the discussion by fetching reference to the turbulent situation of Dollar-Rupee conversion. “At the end of the day, everyone is here to make money. If you are not doing that, then probably you are not adding value to yourself or to the society in which you are operating”, Mr. Bajaj put forward his thought.

Ms. Vibha Padalkar talked about the turbulences observed everyday in financial sector. She elaborated the impact of globalisation by various examples. She also discussed Snow-balling effect, impact of regulatory policies and elaborated change management strategies by discussing examples. “To sum it up, it is necessary for us to be a catalyst of change to cause disruptions in the market.” quoted Ms. Padalkar.

Mr. Sandeep Gokhale highlighted that turbulences are due to perceptions and frequently changing policies. “In short, turbulence is in human mind and there is no external force which comes to announce that there would now be turbulence in the world. Hence, we need to handle the mental turbulence first. Also, there needs to be cohesive working among different sectors. Unless this happens, turbulence is bound to be there in our mind and hence in the market.”

Mr. Bharat Sampat highlighted the role of anticipation of change and making decisions regarding acceptable risk in dealing with turbulences. Mr Sampat said, “In the financial sector, there are four areas where the turbulence can happen i.e. currency, inflation, internal debt & external debt. All these four can have effect on banking. These are the signals to be watched for.” Mr Sampat also advised audience to watch out for changes in technology.

Mr. Sudeep Nair highlighted the new ways of working that can emerge through the turbulences by saying “Whenever a company faces turbulence, whether by their own will or by external forces they will get transformed. So, we need to define new ways of working in the future. That is what the function of ‘Business Transformation’ does.”

Mr. Srinivasan Gopalan elaborated the brighter side of turbulences by saying, “I just love turbulence because my presence is felt during turbulence than when things are going good. If we can make a difference to an organization then that is why we should exist.” Mr. Gopalan also elaborated on the role of customers, intermediaries, shareholders. He also stressed on establishing and maintaining relations with them.

On a positive note, panellist concluded that the turbulence would always be there and how we respond to it would make the difference. 

Panel Discussion -2:-

The topic for second panel discussion was ‘Is your Talent Strategy built for Uncertain Times?’. The theme was chosen in order to understand the human aspect of managing turbulences.  The panel included following dignitaries:-

1.      Mr. Vinay Deshpande, Chief People Officer, Financial Services Sector, Mahindra & Mahindra (Moderator)

2.      Dr. Ajay Oberoi, Chief People Officer & Head Admin, IDBI Federal

3.      Mr. Vikram Bector, Chief Talent Officer, Tata Motors

4.      Dr.  Sheen Akkara, Director (HR), India Region, Nielsen

5.      Mr. Manoj Phadnis, Group Executive Vice President & Head HCM, Yes Bank

6.      Mr. Rituraj Sar, VP & Head- Learning & Development, Lupin Ltd.

Mr. Vinay Deshpande, who was the moderator, started the discussion by putting forward his thoughts on the subject. Mr Deshpande elaborated ‘Talent’ as an uncompromisable necessity. He lucidly described his idea of talent management by saying,
“Today there is turbulence, but tomorrow there might be an upswing. So, I would like to look at talent from both fishing and farming perspective”,

Dr. Ajay Oberoi put forth some examples from history, like Gold-Carter Breakage, Asian Financial Crisis to bring in some perspective. Dr Oberoi also explained how people failed to learn lessons from these situations. Going back to basics was his advice to the talent managers of the future.  

Mr. Manoj Phadnis elaborated his take on talent by saying “It is actually the matter of identifying what every individual has the ability and utilizing it for the benefit of the organization and that’s what real talent is all about.” According to him, the key was to identify opportunity, engaging people, being proactive and gaining trust of employees.

Dr. Sheen Akkara compared career to a marathon and stressed the huge advantage of starting career in uncertain times. Underlining the importance of loyalty, he said, “It is necessary to preserve loyalty during uncertain times. The only thing that is certain in the organizations is the ‘Uncertainty’.”

Mr. Vikram Bector explained the human nature that tries to get away from turbulences. Maintaining energy and learning from the experiences was the success Mantra according to Mr. Bector. Underlining the role of a talent manager, he said, “Top talent, Expectations from the gen-next, Culture etc. are some of the levers that HRs need to handle during uncertain times. “

Mr. Rituraj Sar elaborated the role played by sense of purpose in surviving through the tough times by saying, “We need to ask three questions to ourselves viz. 1) What is my trigger? 2) What makes me get the best out of myself? 3) What makes me double up my ownership and accountability for whatever I am doing? If we try to get answers to these 3 questions, we would get the purpose going for ourselves. “

All in all, the entire event was a grand success. Students of SIMSREE got a lifetime opportunity to interact with many industry stalwarts and that too on the single stage. They got tremendous amount of knowledge from the eminent guests that served the purpose of the event. SIMSREE thanks all the guest speakers who graced SIM’ergence 14 despite their tight schedules.

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SIMCON organizes Confluence'14 successfully

Confluence, an annual consulting conclave at Sydenham institute of Management Studies, Research and Entrepreneurship Education (SIMSREE) is a platform to discuss the current issues plaguing the nation from the viewpoint of a consultant. Confluence ’14, sponsored by LIC India in association with Syndicate Bank was held on 25th January, 2014. Organized by SIMCON, the consulting club of SIMSREE, Confluence’14 saw a plethora of senior professionals from diverse functions and industry discuss the challenges and possible solutions to the problem that is currently grappling the nation and also the theme of Confluence ’14 – “Business Sustainability in a VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity) world". 

With the lineup of star professionals as speakers and panelists, quality opinions and discussions on sustainability and an enthusiastic and an inquisitive audience to complement the above, the event surely had to be a huge success!

Confluence ’14 began on a high note with the Chief Guest for the day Mr. Sridar Iyengar, Ex- Chairman and CEO, KPMG and Co-Founder, The Sounding Board addressing the batch on the attributes necessary to achieve stability in times of uncertainty. He stressed on the importance of an individual needing to connect different aspects of business viz. Human Capital, Technology, Data, and Experience among others. 

This was followed by the speech by the Chief Speaker Dr. Nachiket Mor, Head of the financial inclusion committee setup by RBI and the chairman of CARE. Mr. Mor spoke about the need for financial inclusion in the nation and stressed how banking needs to spread across the nation covering thoroughly the rural areas of India. He opined that currently supply side needs to broaden to cater the banking demand and he suggested serving this need through use of technology like ‘Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPI)’ with the help of mobile service providers, through appointing business correspondents who would act on behalf of the banks inter alia. 

Post the speeches by the chief guests, panel discussions took place. The first panel had an incredible lineup of speakers coming from background ranging from management consulting to banking to entrepreneurship. The panel comprised of Mr. Gaurav Bagaria, Senior Manager at EY, Mr. A. Narayanan, COO Finance, HSBC and Mr. Chandrasekharan Tatapudy, Co-founder, Yasham P2D Lifesciences Pvt. Ltd.  The panel was moderated by Mr. Yatrik Vin, Sr. VP, NSE. The panel discussed about the “Opportunities for investment in India”. They concluded the discussion by suggesting on having a balance of inorganic growth (through M&A overseas and within the nation) and organic growth through correction of policy paralysis resulting in an investment friendly business environment.

The second panel discussion began post the lunch break and this panel comprised of Mr. Anuj Bharagava, CEO, A B Associates, Mr. Sandeep Kothari, Director, Capgemini Consulting and the very own alumnus of SIMSREE Mr. Parag Risbud, VP, Avalon Consulting. The path for the discussion was traced by the moderator Mr. Suresh Mhatre, VP, TCS and the President of IMCI. The topic for the panel was – “Overseas avenues for Indian products and services”.  The panel suggested improvement in our trade competitiveness through increased exports is possible through policies that aim at catalyzing them, identifying specialized products and services which India is capable of offering at a premium price, developing ability to value add and finally tapping the full potential of Indian consumption.

The speakers were deeply impressed with the nature of the questions posed to them by the batch and according to them this reflected the batch’s awareness about the recent happenings in the world. 

SIMCON is determined to continue its tradition of linking the theoretical management concepts to the real world business problems by interfacing with the industry and we strive to make sure that the next version of Confluence is bigger than Confluence’14.

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SIMSREE'ites at the 2nd edition of Inclusive Innovation Summit

Businesses in India are being buffeted with grim head-winds on many fronts. Innovation is the need of the hour to achieve profitable growth in such a difficult environment. Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) partnered with Singapore Management University (SMU) to organize the 2nd edition of Inclusive Innovation Summit based on the theme 'Innovating Practices in Turbulent Times' on 28th October 2013 at Vivanta by Taj President, Mumbai. 11 SIMSREE students accompanied by Prof. Sangeeta Pandit attended this conference.

The seminar was inaugurated by Mr. Ninad Karpe (Chairman, CII Maharashtra State Council) who welcomed the speakers and the audience. This session included a speech by Mr. R Mukundan (Chairman, CII Western Region & Managing Director, Tata Chemicals Ltd.) emphasizing on affirmative inclusivity, a presentation by Professor Rajendra Srivastava (Provost & Deputy President, SMU), an addressal by Mr. Madhukar Sabnavis (Vice Chairman & Country Head, Ogilvy & Mather Pvt. Ltd.) which included many interesting audio-visuals. The inaugural address was delivered by Mr. Jayant Kumar Banthia (Chief Secretary, Government of Maharashtra) who mentioned about the challenges faced and innovations undertaken by the government.

The pre-lunch session was divided into two sub-sessions. The first sub-session had a live video conference from Singapore addressed by Professor Arnoud De Meyer and Professor Peter Williamson from Singapore Management University (SMU). It was moderated by Professor Rajendra Srivastava. The theme of this session was 'Leveraging the Asian Innovation Environment'. It focused on the growing importance of innovation in Asia and the possibilities for companies to take advantage of the highly dynamic innovation environment. Using China as a case study, the session looked at ways in which Asian companies are approaching the challenge of ramping up innovation on the basis of re-innovation and by industrializing research and development.

The topic of the second sub-session was 'Business Model Innovation-Lessons from the East and West'. Mr. Srivastava opened the topic with a wonderful comparison between an expensive French restaurant and an inexpensive Chinese restaurant and explaining the DuPont model. The key take-away's from this session included creating values for customers first and then thinking about extracting values, the need to invest in the right combination of assets which includes tangible as well as intangible assets and the opportunity cost of not doing business model innovations. It is important to innovate your business model and improve its reach to all sets of customers.

The post lunch session included two panel discussions. The topic for the first panel discussion was 'Connecting the Last Mile'. The panel included Mr. G Sunderraman (Executive Vice President, Godrej & Boyce Ltd.), Mr. Manoj Dawane (Vice President, Ericson India), Mr. Vishwesh Palekar (Senior Vice President, Mahindra and Mahindra Ltd.), Mr. Amit Paithankar (Managing Director, Emerson Process Manaement) and Mr. Biten Kathrani (Director Enrichment & IP, Johnson & Johnson Ltd.). Professor Shantanu Dutta from Singapore Management University (SMU) moderated this panel discussion. This panel discussion brought together leaders from the various fields to discuss the challenges they faced to bridge the gap between developing ideas and increased product development. The topic for the second panel discussion was 'Milking the Cows'. The panel included Dr. Ranjan Banerjee (CEO, Renaissance Strategic Consultants & Visiting Professor, Carlson School of Management), Mr. Kannan Tinnium (Technology Leader, GE Global Researh), Mr. Tarun Agarwal (Head- Alternate Channels, Products & Innovations, Development Banking and Financial Inclusion Group, Ratnakar Bank Limited) and Ms. Nilima Achwal (Executive Producer, Villgro's SEED). Professor Srinivas Reddy from SIngapore Management University (SMU) moderated this panel discussion. This session voiced the views and perspectives of the panelists on ways to cultivate the culture of innovation by encouraging and tapping the entrepreneurial spirit of the employees.

The last session, 'Lessons from Hidden Gems' was dedicated to entrepreneurs who did not succumb to the economic meltdown. This daring group of individuals included Mr. Mahesh Murthy (Founder & CEO, Pinstorm), Mr. Paresh Rajde (Founder & Chairman, Suvidhaa Infoservice P. Ltd.) and Ms. Sweta Mangal (Co-founder & CEO, Ziqitza Health Care Limited). They shared about how they remained undettered by all the obstacles in their path to succeed in their venture and to make the world a better place to live in. Professor Rajendra Srivastava was the session chairman and delivered the concluding remarks by thanking CII, all the panelists of the day and the sponsors.

The key take-away from the summit was learnings from our Asian neighbours like China, Korea, Japan etc., about how they are moving up the rising curve and the innovation models that they use. The panelists during the Q & A round provided a glimmer of hope and a shinning example of what can be done by us and the business models that we can adopt for inclusive innovation. All in all, the 2nd edition of Inclusive Innovation Summit was a grand success and we hope to get many more similar opportunities in future as it gives us tremendous industry exposure which is quintessential in today's competitive environment.

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