Mumbai, Nov 16: Technology will emerge as the key driver for future strategies that companies chart out, said KV Kamath, managing director of ICICI. He was delivering the keynote address at Intelligent Enterprise'99 which started here on Tuesday. This, he said, will force companies to rethink their strategic fundamentals. And that includes those of his own, he emphasised."Organisations will be organic entities much like living beings as they evolve almost daily on the back of information that keeps percolating into their systems and managements will have to evaluate their businesses a lot more frequently than they do now," he said.
This, he explained, meant that the CEO of a company also takes on the role of a CIO. This is true not just for banking, but for any other industry.There are other challenges that have to be contended with, Kamath said.
Rapid evolution of technology has created a challenge for traditional corporates. Coupled with the fact that India is globalising faster than any other point in its history, the situation becomes increasingly difficult, he added.
Therefore, companies will have to look beyond traditional ways of doing business and start looking at multiple channels of distribution if their businesses have to work effectively.
It makes more sense, he explained, when juxtaposed with the fact that serving the customer has to be accorded the highest priority. To illustrate his point, he cited the example of Amazon.com, the world's largest online bookseller. "Amazon has acquired a precious customer base. Now, if it can promise to look after its customers better than any traditional bank, what is to prevent the company from entering the banking business," he said.
This, he said, simply underscores the fact that what is competition today may not be competition tomorrow. This is a reality ICICI acknowledges, he added. Therefore, ICICI is not closed to the possibility of competitors from non-traditional areas to invade its turf. "VSNL or MTNL for that matter with their huge customer base, could be competitors to ICICI," he said.
Facing such competition is possible, Kamath said, only on the back of a lean workforce which is highly technology oriented. "We have kept our staff at 1,200 for the last 10 years even as our business has grown 10-fold," he said.Kamath also lauded the government for introducing the ISP policy for its "seamless" and "flawless" execution. "When we look back at the history of India's development some time in the future, this policy will be one of the biggest developments," he added.
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