CIO's for a Better Tomorrow

There has been a quantum leap of the IT sector over the last decade or so with the advent of cutting-edge mobile application and digital media innovation so much so that it has virtually transformed into a revenue generating department from a cost cutting one, bringing forth  a whole new set of unfamiliar challenges that needs to be addressed. And what better place to have this issue pondered upon than on ‘CIO Strategy Summit’ which was organized by SiliconIndia on May 25 in Pune.

This informative affair was comprised of noteworthy personalities from the IT sector which served as a perfect gridiron to interact and to deliberate on topics ranging from disruptive technologies to controlling of budgets, which will pave the way for IT to conduct its operations in a smooth and productive manner.

Bhushan Akerkar, CIO, Hindalco Industries, Aditya Birla Group, graced the event as the Keynote Speaker sharing valuable insights on his topic ‘Solving Tomorrow’s Problems Today’ which primarily dealt with how MES(Manufacturing Execution System), integrated with ERP can result in meeting orders in a timely and cost effective manner.

This was followed by the panel ‘Forging Stronger Business-IT Relationships’ which included Rajeev Mittal, Head - IT/IS, Piaggio Vehicle , Vijaykumar Ramchandran, AVP-IT, Praj Industries, Ritesh Chaudhari, Country Manager - IT, Henkel Adhesives Technologies India , Suman Basu, GM-IT, Tata Blue Scope Steel as panelists and was moderated by Balaji Ganesan, Global IT - Head, Eaton Technologies. Vijaykumar was efficacious in pointing out that in order  to create significant impact, IT team can bridge the gap between BMT needs (stated and unstated) and IT requirements to get BMT's requirement fulfilled in a meaningful way. And to do this, IT team must also keep abreast with business vocabulary, processes and explain the technology in these terms along with the investment proposition. This will require us to communicate changing laws, compliance requirements, technological changes, future infrastructure need to take action now for a better tomorrow. This in itself will be a challenging mission.

Gaurav Mohan, VP Channels & Head of Mumbai Region, Huawei, gave an intriguing perspective for the topic ‘Enterprise Mobility, Collaboration & Cloud: A New Horizon.’ Ensued was an enlightening session by Nitin Bhandari, Associate Vice President - New Products and Partnerships, Vodafone India on ‘Turning Technology Innovations into a Business Advantage.’

‘Modern Day Internet Threats and Securing Enterprise Networks’, was addressed by Sunil Sharma, VP Operations, Cyberoam. After this, Murtaza Trunkwala, Chief R&D Officer, ESDS Software Solution took the stage to educate us on ‘A Broader Vision to Auto Scaling Cloud.’

Sateen Bailur, Head of IT, Global Banking & Markets, India, HSBC and J.B. Takidar, Head - IT, KSB Pumps were part of the second panel discussion on ‘The Business Impact of IT Consumerization, Mobility and the Cloud’. Gaurav Mohan, VP Channels & Head of Mumbai Region, Huawei moderated the panel. This panel discussion came with a broad message that a trio of mega-trends in mobility, social and cloud computing are converging on the IT/business landscape today.

The CIO Strategy Summit gave light to various spheres of IT. One thing that was for certain was that IT is a business enabler but it was not upto the level of other non-manufacturing business verticals like Banking has created. Moreover, Information Security is an area to look out for. As Ritesh rightly pointed out that in order to understand the business requirements in a better way and accordingly formulate solutions, one needs to put his feet in the shoes of our end customers and not only the internal clients. Nonetheless, the Summit was a forum for senior level IT executives to engage in clear and focused dialogue with their peers and examine their management objectives in a relaxed and vibrant environment. This event was sponsored by Huawei, Vodafone, Cyberoam and ESDS.