Hemant Sonawala
Thinking Ahead

If he had not decided to come back to India in 1962, after his engineering in the US and a stint with Boeing, the fifty years of Indian IT history today might have assumed a different contour. In 1966, even when he set up Hinditron focusing on instrumentation and electronic engineering, he realized the role computers would play in the future. Not surprising, therefore, that Hinditron tied up with Digital to bring minicomputers to India in the 70s, when it also started the country's first commercial CAD data center. Following IBM's exit, Digital was the first MNC to come to India via a Hinditron JV; subsequently in the 80s, Hinditron started local manufacturing, thanks to three technology transfer JVs with Digital, Tektronix, and Schiller AG. Also, as CSI president, Sonawala designed the DOEACC accredited program curricula.

Chandrababu Naidu
Making IT Work
Chandrababu Naidu is a politician who redefined the IT landscape in Andhra Pradesh. He brought in new investments and turned Hyderabad into a global hub for IT. Sadly, Naidus focus on technology did not find favor with the rural electorates. But he virtually defined the paradigm of e-Governance from a practicing politician's perspective. Naidu was a visionary who set about bringing to his state all the best that technology had to offer, even at the risk of incurring backlash from petty politicians. Now most people yearn to see Naidu in the driving seat again, and Andhra Pradesh back on the global IT map.

Shiv Nadar
Making his Mark

For a man educated in the Tamil medium, and one who saw a city for the first time only when he was twenty-two, Shiv Nadar has indeed come a long way, today heading the country's biggest IT conglomerate. He started Microcomp in 1976 (rechristened as HCL) with six friends, and with a capital base of Rs 1.75 lakh borrowed from his PF. And this after relinquishing his job as head of DCM DPthe youngest head in the company's history. When IBM quit India, Nadar moved quickly to replace the vacated space and since then HCL has never looked back. The admirable thing about Nadar has been that he never rested on his laurels. So, even after HCL became India's number one hardware company, he ventured into software services, training, networking, BPO, and even distribution.

KV Kamath
Bankable Bet
ICICI is one of the banks that redefined the banking space by using IT. Whether it is online or mobile banking, ICICI has been the frontrunner. But, that level of technology adoption comes from top management commitment, and thats what becomes evident as one looks at Kamaths track record as the chief of the countrys fastest-growing financial institution. Theres no parallel. A veteran at ICICI, he transformed it into an agile organization, entered new segments in the financial sector, and brought it up to global reckoning in terms of competitiveness and vision. And, it was through technology that KVK brought about a large part of this transformation. A strong proponent of the new economy, Kamath pioneered the initiative to promote a tech company, a venture fund, and a string of Internet companies.

Som Mittal
Man for All Seasons

Though a metallurgical engineer from IIT-Kanpur, IT turned out to be Som Mittal's true calling. In Wipro Infotech, he established the peripherals business which in five years grew to over Rs 100 crore. The peripherals manufacturing factory he set up in technical collaboration with Seiko-Epson was the first in the group to achieve ISO 9000 certification, and also the first unit to be nominated for the Rajiv Gandhi Quality Award. He was instrumental in turning around the fortunes of Digital in India till it was acquired by Compaq and subsequently HP. Mittal has been recently appointed as president of Nasscom.

Nandan Nilekani
The Global Indian

One of the founders of Infosys, Nilekani has taken up several lead roles in the company. Currently, he is co-chairman of the Board of Directors of Infosys, the company he has built passionately along with Murthy and others. Nandan Nilekani was listed among Time magazines 100 most influential people globally in 2005. In January 2006, he became one of the youngest entrepreneurs to join twenty global leaders on the prestigious World Economic Forum (WEF) Foundation Board. For Infosys, Narayana Murthy is the conscience and Nilekani the one who epitomizes professional excellence and execution zeal. Not only has Nilekani proved to be the ideal ambassador to carry forward Murthys legacy, he has also played a key role in shaping the Indian IT industry.

Srinivasan Ramani
Networking India

A networking pioneer, Ramani helped create the countrys first emailthe service was developed to demonstrate Indias capabilities in data networking. Srinivasan Ramani and his fellow scientists pioneered the Internet age in India through the Erneta network connecting education and research institutionsand conducted early experiments in satellite communications. Currently, Ramani is a professor at IIIT-Bangalore. In the past, he was first director of the National Center for Software Technology, Mumbai, and was instrumental in setting up the HP labs in India. He has also served as president of the International Council for Computer Communication, and of the CSI.

Rajiv Gandhi
The Visionary

Rajiv Gandhis political life was short, but it had great impact on Indias scientific outlook. From 1984-89, Rajiv Gandhi was the Prime Minister of India, a young and zealous man who assumed premiership not in the best of times. He will be best remembered for his vision of a modern India, a computerized India. His singular biggest achievement is the New Computer Policy, 1984, announced within 19 days of his assuming power. This new regime liberated the shackled potential of Indian IT, and we are still reaping its fruits. Gandhi also believed in the power of R&D as he set up various technology missions and played a role in setting up C-DAC, that gave India its first indigenous supercomputer.

Harish Mehta
Software Pioneer

It would not be an exaggeration to claim that Harish Mehta helped shape the destiny of the Indian software industry in more ways than one. Along with Saurabh Srivastava, Prakash Ahuja, and Shashi Bhatnagar, he was one of the founder members of Nasscom in 1987. But even more significantly, he handpicked Dewang Mehta after a chance meeting in the corridors of Delhi's Taj Palace Hotel, and placed him at the helm of Nasscom. The rest as they say is a $18 bn history (India's software export figures in 2006). One of the early IT entrepreneurs in the country, Mehta headed the JV when Hinditron brought in Digital during the 80s, the first MNC IT firm to arrive in India, post-IBM's exit. Subsequently, he started Onward Technologies that formed a JV with Novell to market its products in India.

Raman Roy
Seeding the BPO

When in 1993 Raman Roy convinced John McDonald, the comptroller at American Express, to open an operational center for Asia Pacific in India, little could he have imagined the juggernaut he was setting in motion. The seeds of the Indian BPO industry were sown, and henceforth Roy would be known to posterity as the father of Indian BPO. The sobriquet, however, stuck to him mainly because of what he did after setting up the Amex center. First it was setting up GEs captive unit and then going on to found one of the most profitable BPOs of all time, Spectramind (subsequently acquired by Wipro). Roy quit Wipro last year and now manages a private equity fund and a KPO venture, Quattro. Roy might not be driving the BPO juggernaut anymore, but he is sure not to leave the navigators seat soon.

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