Admissions 2011 : Delhi

The admission process began with we "Madrasis" going Northwards (read Delhi). The aircraft housing the 10 faculty members and the 7 student coordinators taking off was symbolic of several careers that are about to take off shortly.

The bugle of the GT-PI was sounded through the video being screened at 8 AM at Vishwakarma Buhawan at IIT Delhi. Regiments of bleary-eyed 20 somethings were ready to take on each other in the GT and give the profs a run for their experience in the PI. We the coordinators simply acted as "Sanjays" educating every candidate about the panel's composition and their demeanor. We also doubled up as impromptu astrologers verifying everyone's Janam-Patri (read testimonials). 

Although there were some teething problems to begin with, the process rolled on smoothly for the 2 days. The turnout was tremendous meaning that competition just got tougher! The candidates and us had sweet memories and the realization that the world is indeed small when mutual contacts were discovered. The process ended on a sweet, healthy note with a helping of Tarzan Singh's hand picked fruits.

Hope that we can better the experience in Chennai and Mumbai. After all, PG has added a little more firepower in the candidates' arsenals!

Contributed by,

Bhawik Raja, DoMS Interface

Class of 2011

Hemu Ramaiah: A Landmark Achievement

Dept. Of Management Studies, IIT Madras was proud to host the founder and ex-CEO of Landmark, Ms. Hemu Ramaiah as part of the MBA Invitation Lecture Series on Wed, 9^th Feb 2010. Ms. Ramaiah is presently MD of shop4solutions, a private equity firm. The topic for the lecture was “The Story of Landmark: Innovation, Challenges, and Learnings”.

Ms. Hemu Ramaiah with 33 years of experience in retailing, began by telling us of her younger days, when as a daughter of an army man, she had to get used to frequent change of residence, staying in towns and cities of India and generally growing up in a world where reading books was a pleasurable pastime and sometimes the only source of entertainment. Coming from a family not even remotely connected to business and not much crazy about books either, Ms. Ramaiah did go against the current by deciding early on that her life was going to revolve around the book industry. She began studying literature in Chennai, and went on to begin her career with books by joining the Taj Bookshop. Displaying great determination and foresight, she planned to set up her own bookstore by the time she turned thirty and to preferably exit by the time she turned fifty. Lofty goals for a twenty-something year old, but as she said “otherwise life would just meander along”.

Pretty soon she had established nine hotel book retail shops and was ready to take the leap. In 1987 with a modest capital of Rs. 12 lacs, she set up shop in Nungambakkam, Chennai. The location was the basement of an office building but one which would grow one day to earn the title of the “cult location” of Landmark. She asked the students to be wary of issuing equity early on during ventures as this could be a big compromise.

From the onset the aim was to create a bookstore which would change the way people perceived book shops in India. A bookshop without textbooks. A bookshop with open display. A bookshop where people could walk around, pick up a book, flip through it instead of coldly purchasing it from across a counter. In other words, Ms. Ramaiah converted the act of purchasing a book into an experience. And she went on to enhance this experience by adding on to the initial offering of only books, chocolates, stationery, toys and music.

Ms. Ramaiah described having tried the franchise model, as well as the joint venture in Calcutta. By late 1990s Landmark was a brand to reckon with and it was getting a lot of attention from the right quarters. In 2001, Landmark was invited operate a branch out of Spencer Plaza in Chennai, the first mall in India. Soon word spread and in 2002 it was operating from Forum Mall in Bangalore and what began as a book shop in a basement turned into an all-India phenomenon. Ms. Ramaiah told everyone about the challenges she faced as an entrepreneur – the forex crisis of 1991, the backward and forward integration troubles, the financing woes. But it seems it’s all been worth it when one looks back at the thrill, and satisfaction of having enriched thousands of lives through Landmark. The ‘Landmark Quiz’ became an event that people of all ages would wait for every year.

With the distinction of having made a profit in every year of its existence, Landmark was in an enviable position. However true to herself, Ms. Ramaiah stuck to her plan, and decided move on, when she invited Tata group company, Trent Ltd. to takeover Landmark in 2008.

Ms. Ramaiah cheerfully answered a variety of questions from the audience and left everybody appreciating this truly great achievement of a person with such humility, grace and charm.

Compiled By,

Team DoMS Interface 

Shashi Tharoor at IIT Madras..

Saarang the annual festival at IIT Madras brings with it a riot of colours of every flavour in every conceivable field - be it arts, music, theatre or dance, to thrill all who become part of this phenomenon. It provides a platform for people to come together, a chance for their ideas to merge, a place for exchange of ideas and emotions, resulting in a confluence so magical that the experience is hard to put into words.

As a pre-cursor to the more than 60 events to be held over a period of 5 days for Saarang 2011, a Pre-Saarang invitation lecture was held today at Student Activity Centre, which hosted none other than honourable Member of Parliament, Dr. Shashi Tharoor.

Dr. Tharoor shared with the students his experiences as a student at St. Stephen’s and later at Tufts University, took them on a quick journey through his early career with the United Nations, and told them about the new role he has donned. He conveyed to the eager young crowd how “sometimes circumstances decide what occurs to your mind, what you do”. He touched a chord with them when he brought out how they could make a difference through their actions and decide on what to do in their lives by the strength of their own convictions.

His stint with the UN High Commission for Refugees was instrumental in his decision to continue with the organization. He related touching stories about refugees from different parts of the world that made all the effort seems worthwhile and very rewarding indeed. Dr. Tharoor was kind enough to field a variety of questions from the students. Questions, which ranged from how he handled a conflict of identity as a gifted writer and as a public figure, to those on the issue of having the system of primaries to improve intra party democracy. He also answered queries regarding his views on WIkiLeaks, relevance of the UN today and India’s stand on Iran’s nuclear program.

Most entertaining were the prolific writer’s exposition on his experience with using social media. References were made to various instances in the past year or two, when the media was increasingly focusing on what Dr. Tharoor had to say and do. Regarding social media, in a lighter vein Dr. Tharoor clarified that his wife (who was among the audience) was not on either Twitter or Facebook and if anyone was following her profile on these sites, it was probably an impostor.

The witty politician exhorted the students to join youth politics and other public forums where they could air their views. He said grassroots experience would enable them to manage the country they would inherit in the coming years. He closed by sending a message to the young people that they cannot fear to do the small acts in fear of failing in bigger endeavours. Calling everyone to be fearless in realizing their dreams, Dr. Tharoor admitted that he’s failed many times but he does not regret the learnings he’s gained from them. He said, after all it is “in trying, that you discover your worth.”

By,

Edwin Antony,

Class of 2011. 

India Venture Capital and Private Equity Report 2010

On 2nd November 2010, we at DoMS IIT Madras, witnessed the release of the India Venture Capital and Private Equity (VCPE) report of 2010 by Prof. A. Tillai Rajan in the presence of distinguished guests, such as Mr. Arun Jain, chairman and CEO of Polaris software labs, Dr. M. S. Ananth, Director of IIT Madras, Prof. C. Rajendran, Head of DoMS and Prof. L. S. Ganesh.

The author of the Indian VCPE report, Prof. A. Thillai Rajan gave us a brief summary on the key findings published in the report. The report captures data of the past six years i.e 2004 to 2009 and  highlights certain features which are both motivating and astonishing. The investments happening in Indian through VCPE investors stands to be third largest in the world. A study of  338 VCPE investors revealed that even though these investors have poured in large amount of money, only 0.17% of the companies have been able to utilize this capital. Bulk of the investment, about 69% by numbers and about 85% by amount, is of foreign origin and too much volatile. Even though the amount is impressive, the nature of the investment breeds fear since most investors have single investment and little commitment. Most investments, about 78% in all are focused at urban enterprises and mostly the deals take place in metropolitan cities. In other words, they are not inclusive. Furthermore, the investors are “consistently inconsistent” as Prof. Thillai Rajan put it. Only ten investors are consistent, of which 40% are Indian. This belies the proportion of total investments we saw above. Also, the steady decline in the number of new investors invites concern. The report has a healthy contribution from students and is accepted in various journals.

The studies carried out and compiled in the report make it obvious that we as a country cannot afford to be complacent just because the conditions are favourable now. It is necessary that we look into the matter and prevent the pretty picture from turning ugly.

By,

DoMS Interface Team 

MBA Batch of 2012

28th Endowment Lecture of IIT-M & EFSI

On the 11th of November, the Twenty Eighth Endowment Lecture of IIT, Madras & Employers’ Federation of Southern India was held at DoMS, IIT-M. President of EFSI Mr.A. Venkatramani provided the welcome address by briefing on the Origin of EFSI, its interaction with the government on matters of labour legislation. Professor K. Ramamurthy, Dean (Academic Courses) gave the presidential address and introduced to us the Chief Guest of the evening Mr. Raju Venkatraman, Founder & CEO, Medall Healthcare Services Pvt Ltd.

Mr. Raju enlightened us with a lecture on 'The Future of Services Industry in India'. He started it off on a humorous note that he was no astrologer to predict without facts! He set his agenda for the evening to throwing the paradigms in the future service industry& presenting us with collected benchmark data. His initial focus was on the contribution of the service Industry towards the GDP of the nation. He focused on GDP at Purchase Power Parity (where India stays 4th in the list)as he regarded that to be a more relevant number than just the GDP. He came up with stats stating that among BRIC nations, India is more agrarian than others and yet 52% of its GDP came through the services sector. He also mentioned about the productivity delta stating that only 24% of India’s workforce contribute to this 52% contribution to GDP.
He remarked that Export oriented services would soon give way to services for and within the country. As he talked about the service sector boom, he gave the Telecom sector flourish as an elucidation to the case in point. With respect to people’s perception of the industry he said that if a service is simple, accessible and can make people perceive its value, they will definitely embrace the service.

Much of his speech centred on the fact that India is poised for growth in the service sector and it needs a clear technological, demographic & regulatory framework to handle it efficiently. He provided the inspiring air by mentioning that the Service industry growth would be directly proportional to the ambitions of the younger generation. He stressed upon the fact that Technology breakthrough & Innovations are a must for service sector’s future growth.

Coming from an IT/IT-ES industry background, he vouched for the role that  IT/IT-ES could play as a model for other service sector industries. He also asked us to be cautious and not to use Services & IT-ITES interchangeably as IT contributes to only a meagre amount in the services sector! He presented to us some slides indicating the paradigm shifts that services sector industries have undergone over the past century. He ended the presentation with a thought-provoking & engaging video that showed how the definition of ‘WORK’ could see a sea change in the near future! The video suggested that the future of work would be transparent, flat & extremely competitive. In that sense, the session was definitely an eye-opener!

Posted by
DoMS Interface Team