Nasscom 2007 : Finalists Announced of Innovation in IT 2006

NASSCOM the premier trade body and the “voice” of the Indian IT industry announced the finalists for the NASSCOM Innovation in Awards 2006. From a shortlist of eighteen companies, seven finalists will be felicitated and recognised for their outstanding contribution by Hon’ble Prime Minister of India Shri Manmohan Singh at the upcoming NASSCOM 2007 India Leadership Forum.

IT innovation is slowly gathering momentum in India. As global customers and giant ICT companies outsource their core product development and R&D work to the country and as its service providers make “out-of the-box” services a key differentiator, an ecosystem of innovation is getting built in India.

Congratulating the finalists, Kiran Karnik, President, NASSCOM, said, “With each success come greater expectations. Today the Indian IT industry is seen as the forerunner in many areas and one of the key reasons we have been able to reach this milestone is due to the emphasis the industry places on innovation. It is in this context that one foresees India as the future innovation hub of the world. Diversity nurtures innovation, and where else do you see so much diversity – not only socially and culturally, but also geographically and, sadly, financially?”

“Delivering “more” or “better” can be done by increasing efficiency, but beyond a point the curve begins to flatten and it becomes increasingly difficult to keep providing even more value-for-money. The only way to do so is through innovation: not just executing the same series of steps more efficiently, but of doing something completely different to achieve the required output. To be able to contribute to the innovation led environment, NASSCOM has constituted the Innovation in IT awards which have become a platform for companies to showcase their pioneering work. In a first-of-its-kind initiative, NASSCOM is mulling a proposal to facilitate an industry-supported innovation fund with a corpus of at least Rs 100 crore to drive innovation. Innovation at various levels has been identified as the next imperative to sustain growth and maintain the edge of the Indian IT industry in the global markets”, he added.

About the Finalists

The award winners have been chosen for the following innovations:

Bharti Airtel and IBM India for the innovative business model under which Bharti outsourced all of its IT to IBM. This was a globally historic deal.

Evaluserve.com for its business intelligence services, customized reports and value-added research to clients in different industry verticals, such as Banking, Insurance, Hi-Technology, Pharmaceuticals and Bio-technology, Chemicals, Energy, Consumer Goods, Discrete and Process Manufacturing.

HP Labs India for Gesture Keypad which is a pen based input device for phonetic scripts with larger character set. Gesture keypad revolutionizes the way data is inputted.

Ittiam Systems Private Limited for its Advanced Digital Audio and Video signal processing algorithms for embedded system design of IP Video Phone (IPVP) and Portable Media Player Recorder (PMPR) products.

Kale Consultants for its platform based BPO using Kale’s product REVERA™.

Strand Life Sciences Pvt. Ltd for its comprehensive and modular data mining and predictive modeling platform branded as avadisTM, short for access, visualize, analyze and discover.

Monsoon Multimedia India Private Limited for HAVA – the world’s first integrated video “time-shifting” and “place-shifting” product. Place-shifting is perhaps one of the most exciting technologies for device manufacturers in the “digital lifestyle” ecosystem, bringing TV (or any video) to the device anytime, anywhere.

About NASSCOM Innovation in IT Awards

The key focus for the NASSCOM Innovation Forum has been to build innovation as the key differentiator for the Indian IT and BPO industry. In its third year now, the NASSCOM Innovation Awards is the premier recognition for Indian IT companies who have instilled innovation into existing competence and have created new ideas, products, processes or technologies that drive businesses to achieve higher margins and thus profits to re-invest in the business. Post the success of this initiative in 2006; the platform has been broad based this year to include more companies innovating at various fronts.

The Indian IT-BPO industries have achieved significant maturity and consolidation over the past few years and are now set for their next phase of evolution and momentum. Having explored various dimensions for achieving global leadership and building competitive advantage through rightly skilled, industry-relevant, specialized manpower, robust infrastructure and a favourable regulatory environment, the IT-BPO industry is on the hunt for a new success mantra. Innovation has been identified as the key imperative for the growth of the Indian IT-BPO industry that will enable India to sustain its lead in the world markets. The NASSCOM-McKinsey Study 2005 makes a strong case for innovation, suggesting that the Indian IT-BPO sector can generate over US$ 10-15 billion of additional revenues by 2010—over and above its US$ 60 billion export target—provided it makes innovation its chief growth catalyst.

In line with this, the key focus for the NASSCOM Innovation Forum has been to foster innovation as the key differentiator for the Indian IT and BPO industry. The broad award categories for 2006 include Business Model, Process and Product innovation, for both emerging companies and large and MNC companies. This forum for IT innovators in India has seen participation from 160 companies from across the industry this year.

Process Innovation
Process Innovation is the new mantra for the industry wherein through combination of tools and productivity enhancements, the industry players both Indian and multinational are redefining operational excellence and contributing to business transformation needs of their customers

Product Model Innovation
The product industry in India has also been on a growth path and is increasingly witnessing new technology and enterprise products being developed for the international and local markets. The NASSCOM Product Innovation awards received an overwhelming response with over 60 percent of the nominations being filed in this category. This is the reflection of that fact that product innovation is a key thrust area for the emerging companies, the large players as well as the R&D centers of multinational companies.

Business Model Innovation
Business Model innovation has been identified by Global CEOs as their number one priority as the technology business becomes ever more competitive and there is increasing globalisation of the marketplace.