Wipro-Erehwon Innovation Awards honor champions

BANGALORE, INDIA: Wipro Technologies, the global IT arm of Wipro Limited has announced the Wipro-Erehwon Applied Innovation Awards 2007. The event that was held at the Wipro Campus in Electronic City, Bangalore where honoured Wipro innovators and innovations.

Applied Innovation is the ability to infuse newer ideas and newer ways of doing things into all parts of the organization, and improve business outcomes, often without major disruptive change.

The jury panel had eminent members from both industry and academia including Dr Prakash G Apte, Director, IIM, Bangalore and Dr Sridhar Mitta, e4e Labs. Wipro Technologies Chief Operating Officer, Dr A L Rao is spearheading the awards initiative. The total number of applications that were received were 240, 40 finalized and 15 declared winners. The winners were in categories of Product/Service Innovation, Process Innovation, Delivery Model Innovation and Business Model Innovation. The criterion for selection ranged from Uniqueness and Impact to Sustainability and Leverage.

Wipro has fine-tuned the science of viewing innovation though the lens of practicality to design unique solutions for end customers. It is a 360-degree business approach covering process, delivery, business and technology. This award aims at recognizing innovation implemented on client projects and the output of the innovation should be quantified as benefits to clients.

Divakaran Mangalath, chief technology officer, Wipro Technologies said, “We are consistently told that innovation generates competitive advantage, ensuring organizations remain at the cutting edge of product design and customer service. But for many large businesses, real innovation is more likely to be about making day to day improvements in how the business operates in terms of people and process and this in itself helps promote a culture of greater innovation within the business rather than enforcing innovation through paradigm shifts in product and service.”

Wipro has also launched the Global Applied Innovation Awards for Business Excellence in collaboration with the IT Association of America, International Association of Outsourcing Professionals and Forbes.com. 

As a part of the ongoing Applied Innovation campaign, Wipro has also launched the Applied Innovation Council which is a high-level forum comprising Wipro customers, industry experts, analysts and thought leaders to analyze industry trends and work on collaborative solutions to address new consumers, markets and business challenges.

Wipro is the world’s largest independent research and development services provider and offshore third party testing services provider. Over 8 per cent of Wipro’s global revenues today are is a direct result of the company’s innovation agenda.