Some R&D centres are labs, others are kitchens

BANGALORE, INDIA: Whenever David Ogilvy, the legend of Advertising, wanted to explain a creative outfit like a research laboratory or an architect's office or an advertising agency, he would lean towards how a great kitchen is managed.

Pulling out pages from his memories of working as a chef (yes, he cooked meals too) at a hotel in Paris, he would recall, "There were thirty-seven chefs in our brigade. We worked like dervishes, from morning to night we sweated and shouted and cursed and cooked. Every man was inspired by one ambition in that kitchen - to cook better than any chef had ever cooked."

Probably the reason why Ogilvy's chef saucier told him that by the time a cook is forty, he is either dead or crazy, or why his chef potager threw forty-seven raw eggs across the kitchen towards Ogilvy's head (scoring nine direct hits, by the way) (and because his patience had been exhausted by the latter's raids on his stock pot in search of bones for the poodles of an important client).

This and more just offers a glance at the happy, electric, extreme chaos that goes on invisibly behind the curtains and comfy smiles of waiters when we eat at a good restaurant.

R&D centres, the good ones we mean, are in some way distant cousins of creative ovens run by eccentric but excellent chefs.

First, there is that random rhythm in all the hustle-and-bustle that meets an ordinary eye. Second, there is a purpose to all the madness one can sniff around. And then, of course, there is that hunger-extraordinaire to create something that will not just feed a client, but delight him/her to the soul.

Innovation is not always about brains, it's about minds and stomachs rumbling loudly for breakthroughs. Is the technology industry keeping up to its notoriety of running tough kitchens even at this age of competition and scurrying for patents (ahem, with a different appetite though if you have been reading about trolls a lot)?

Here, we get a chance to talk to Shailendra Ravi, Sr.Director, Strategy and Emerging Markets, EMC India

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Incidentally, EMC India Center of Excellence (CoE) says it is proud to have received top honours second time in a row for ‘Great Place to Innovate' and ‘Best Technical Role Model' award categories at the recently held Zinnov Confluence 201. It was also awarded for its ‘Best in Class Ability to Create Next Generation Leaders'.

The India center was assessed on the approach it has taken to foster innovation, engaging employees across levels, establishing accountability within teams, innovating through university collaboration, cross BU collaboration and innovating for local market needs. These turned out to be some of its focus areas to enhance EMC's portfolio through innovation and establish the India center as a center for innovation within and outside EMC.

Let's get ourselves a whiff of why or why not a capable and well-run Centre of Excellence can be just the sous chef a CEO would love to have.

What makes you excited about the CoE and how is it not just another backyard for routine work?

 

EMC, like a global captive with this in-house centre has evolved and matured a lot in last decade. Most of the engineering talent in India has been tapped already but now people are shifting to questions on ‘value'. So, we have seen two emerging thoughts here - one, on a critical mass of engineers to take ownership, so as to build thought leadership as well as deep technical expertise. We have done that with two approaches - inside-out (with our engineers and senior consultants) and outside-in (with customers and stakeholders). Then, there has to be an intersection of three changing contexts: regulator or business models, customers and also EMC as a company. That's the spot of overlap where we can transform solutions and create new markets for customers.

Is experimentation, on that route, a costly piece?

One key input we have found is that the salesperson can also identify a problem which can intersect with an engineer's desk. We also have specific programs where APJ market is going for long-term bets.

Is the effort showing results already?

It would be apt to mention how we have made progress with ideas like content collaboration tools for government files, or video-surveillance solutions for private environments in new models, or the same solution in an opex model, or our work-in-progress on back-up-as-a-service in some verticals. To create back-up infrastructure is a challenge given the risk of eventualities, risks and to ensure continuity. Large companies spend on this on Disaster Recovery ways. When we did a survey, we found some possible areas to work on and are on the way with a roadmap.

What kind of work and ideas have gone behind your Robot for data centres?

Well, organizations in India are strangled with the IT infrastructure that was designed for storing data few years back. With so many third parties in the market who are providing data center solutions, Indian IT managers are still apprehensive to transfer the ownership to these third party providers. To manage data requires physical infrastructure which in turns means more energy consumption and cost. Along with growing storage needs for these existing data centers also comes spending on cooling solutions and power. To address this, three engineers from EMC India COE developed just a solution which is proving to be a successful data center efficiency model and is the Data Center Robot. It monitors various environmental parameters of the Data Center from cooling, navigation, sensors, temperature etc. This robot can also be used for certain co-location DCs. The robot has the ability to indicate if the temperature has gone up or down and at the same time recommends the right amount of temperature that is required which can be set remotely. The warmer the datacenter, the lower the usage of cooling and this results in major savings. Testing of the product shows that DC Robot can save about 10-20% of the power consumption of the datacenter.

Are you all set to take it to markets?

Not so much as of now as we will have to refine and make it a little market-ready. Any new product introduction takes time. Pilots take time. Currently tests are being done and we are working on making it production-ready

Can a R&D centre deliver beyond the cost-centre stigma already?

There are two kinds of aspirations. One is on employee involvement in high-end technology and then there are organization's expectations with investments. It is a journey and function of meeting both - corporate ROI needs and employee's appetite to grow. In any typical R&D centre, some business units with deep expertise sit along with other cost-centered units. One needs to have an arbitrage with efficiencies, future, responsibility and consistency. That said, some R&D centres are way ahead than others because they have a different maturity level. It depends a lot on the culture.