RAJIV MODY Sasken Communications Technologies Ltd Headquartered in Bangalore, the firm is a provider of telecom software services and solutions.

When Pradeep Singh bid goodbye to a thriving man-agement career in Microsoft eight years ago, he had a simple motto: do for the “Made in India” logo what Sony did for “Made in Japan”. It soon became the mission statement, first for Aditi Technologies and later for Talisma Inc—both emerging from the Singh incubator. Now, years after that day in 1994, Singh has reason to be smug. Last week, the World Economic Forum (wef) accorded him global recognition by picking him as one of the top technology pioneers in the world who are applying the most innovative and transformational technologies. Joining him in the elite list of 36 global tech pioneers for 2002 are four other Indians—Amish Mehta of CommercialWare Inc, Sanjay Parekh of Digital Envoy Inc, Dev Gupta of Narad Networks and Rajiv Mody of Sasken Communication Technologies Inc.

The wef also reinvited 33 other tech pioneers from the past two years for their continuing innovation. This list, again, includes four Indians—Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw of Bicon India, Kallam Anji Reddy of Dr Reddy’s group, Vinay Deshpande of Encore Software Ltd and Gururaj Deshpande of Sycamore Networks Inc.

PRADEEP SINGH Aditi Technologies, Talisma Inc Succeeded in creating a company that had a predominantly Indian base but with a strong global presence.

All of them will join scientists, academics, ngos and other members for the wef meetings, scheduled for the first time in New York from January 31. “Our members can learn a lot from these emerging leaders—both in terms of how to use new technologies most effectively and how to keep their businesses nimble,” says Jose Maria Figueres, managing director of wef. “For the tech pioneers, it is a great opportunity to think creatively about new applications of their technology from a business perspective and in the context of social development,” he adds.

The programme, created in partnership with Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu in 2000, was designed to provide a new perspective on the technology horizon. It created a network of professionals operating on the cutting edge of technology in the field of proteomics, peer-to-peer, renewable energy and Internet infrastructure. From this effort was born the Technology Empowerment Network (ten), which provides the institutional framework for the wef tech pioneers to sustain their efforts. The purpose of ten is to identify, support and empower projects—for which Information Technology plays a central role—that contribute to improving the state of the world.

It fits in well with the spirit of some of the new entrants to the club. According to Singh, Aditi Technologies as well as the Talisma venture were borne out of his desire to give back to his country of origin. He says, “I was just a fortunate migrant for whom the dice rolled well, having been a part of Microsoft when it went public. Part of my pledge was to give back to my country in a space which I understood, which is clearly building a technology company.”
Not just any technology company. As he says, for a long time there was no global presence of Indian companies. Then along came the Infosys storm. “Yes, it was a global brand. But to an extent this was a reflection of the stock market behaviour,” says Singh. He wanted to go one better and create a company with a predominantly Indian base but with a strong global presence. “Talisma has achieved the objective,” Singh says with pride. “We built a business model to shift not just engineering but also pre-sale and technical work and the back office to India; 80 per cent of our staff is in India but in the eyes of the customers we are a US company.”

Singh defines this as the shrinking of distance. “You can apply the same principle to shrink the massive distance between a village and an urban centre. Distance is no longer measured in geography but in terms of the time it takes for information to flow. If you drive out of India, you are further back in time than Delhi is from New York. And that is a function of time you take to get information to a user,” he argues.

Fired by similar zeal is Sanjay Parekh, co-founder of Digital Envoy and a man who leads the strategic vision of the company. “It means a lot for us as a company and implies that we are doing cutting-edge work—something that impacts the world,” he says about the wef nomination. Developer of Internet mapping technology, Digital Envoy has among its funders the venture capital duo of AOL-Time Warner and Siemens AG.

Founded in early 1999, the principal focus of the company is to develop software for use in monitoring and customising advertising, enforcing digital syndication rights, detecting fraud and general security online contracts. “We do not track people. We don’t use cookies or user registration. We operate like a search engine and don’t know about user e-mails and hence, we don’t invade an individual’s privacy.”

Essentially, businesses are able to pick up the demographic profile of the user without actually encroaching on an individual’s privacy. Pare it down to the social context and it provides a powerful implement to policy planners and businesses alike. By being able to identify an Internet user, it makes pre-selection easier. Hence, for the user it can mean using the Internet in a local language—for example, a user in Gujarat who does not understand English can access the Net using his native language. And for business it means providing local content. Or even better, targeted advertising.

“The social message of our technology is that we create the basis for providing content in local language. In other words, access to the Internet can be enhanced by overcoming the barrier of language. Hence, we are contributing to bridging the digital divide,” says Parekh. The focus of the next phase of the company’s efforts is to work on technology to speed the delivery process.

In a similar league is Amish Mehta, chairman of CommercialWare Inc. He is responsible for charting the company’s strategic direction and promoting its innovative software technology. CommercialWare provides software solutions that enable retailers to interact, transact with and service their customers across multiple channels, ensuring high levels of customer satisfaction and loyalty. Mehta joined the firm after a stint at General Atlantic Partners, a global venture capital firm, where he identified key investment opportunities and provided strategic direction to technology executives in emerging technology markets.

Also pitchforked into the elite league is Rajiv Mody, chairman and ceo of Sasken Communications Technologies Ltd, a provider of telecom software services and solutions. Last year it had announced its intention to collaborate with Intel to jointly seek out solutions in the future markets for wireless. With the headquarters in Bangalore, it has offices in Canada, Japan, Sweden, UK and the US.

The tech pioneers will have an added hue as it will be the first of its kind gathering after the dust has settled on the dotcom bubble burst. As wef President Klaus Schwab puts it: “The technology pioneers are at the forefront of change in a variety of technology sectors. We are excited to bring this community to our annual meeting in New York.”