Day 9: Mr. Scindia and Celebration Lunch

Day 9 was the final day for the group. We had a quick meeting with Jyotiraditya Scindia, the Minister of State for IT and Communications and also a GSB grad. Then we had a celebration lunch. At this point, the trip was over and many went out to do some last minute (or first minute) Christmas shopping or head to the airport.

As you can see from reading the blog, this trip was an incredible opportunity for all involved. Each day was packed with very high quality meetings and cultural stops. I for one was extremely grateful to get such a rich perspective of India's political and business environment in 10 short days. All the credit must go to our trip leaders: Dana Mauriello, Evan Reas, Abheek Anand, Sudarshan Srinivasan and Ishan Gupta. They promised us a BSTE (best study trip ever) and surely delivered.

Thanks for viewing the blog, and please feel free to leave your comments here for the group. See you all back on campus soon!

Best,
Eric

Day 8: Winrock, Walmart, Airtell, President Kalam

Day 8 was another packed day - we met with the head of Winrock (large NGO in the country), the CEO of Walmart in India, the CEO of Airtell (largest mobile operator) and India's last President, Dr. Kalam. We wrapped up the day with another alumni dinner. Another very informative day for the group where we were able to learn about non-profit work, retailing, telecommunications and politics directly from top leaders in the field.

Here's the group getting ready for Dr. Kalam.

Day 7: The Taj Mahel, home visits

Words and pictures can't do justice to the Taj Mahel, so I'm not going to try. All I'm going to do is recommend that you fly to Delhi and take a 5hr ride to Agra yourself. It is truly incredible.

Here's the group... may have to get a photoshop expert on this one to get rid of the fog. Trust me, it's back there.

So, while most of us were asleep for the 5 hour journey to the Taj, most of us were awake for the way home. I took the opportunity to teach some people about eucre, a traditional card game from Indiana. That's IndiaNA not India. Here's Kelly celebrating a solid trip to "the barn."

We quickly went out again after returning to our hotel. Our trip leaders graciously opened up their homes to the group for dinner. I was lucky enough to spend the evening with Abheek and his family and had my favorite meal of the trip. Others went to Suda's family's house or Ishan's sister house. It was a unique and great way to experience the culture of Delhi.

Day 6: Humayun's tomb, Network 18, IBM Daksh

Day 6 began with a trip to Humayun's tomb. Humayun was the second Mughal Emperor to rule India and died in the 16th century. One of the more impressive last resting places that I've seen throughout the world...

Here's some detail from inside the tomb. A local pointed it out for 100 rupees - well worth it!!

We then moved on to a visit with Rajdeep Sardesai, the managing editor of CNN-IBM. He's also a very well known news anchor in the country - our trip leaders seemed to be a little star struck by the meeting! Mr Sardesai spoke to the group for about an hour, answering questions ranging from the media's role in fighting corruption to business practices in media in the country. Here we are sporting our channel 18 hats, getting ready to take a final picture. You can see Mr. Sardesai in the center with our signature bottle of wine gift.

From channel 18, we drove to IBM - Daksh to meet with the company's founder and CEO, Pavan Vaish. Mr. Vaish had a great perspective for the group on managing a company from founding to maturity within the India market. After a lengthy Q&A, we toured a call center on the premises.

After the meeting we arrived home late to the hotel. Personally, I called it a night but many fearless trip mates ventured out for some local bhangra club dancing. I imagine that the night probably looked something like the picture below...

Day 5: Infosys and flight to Delhi

Day 5 was dedicated to a trip to Infosys, the IT outsourcing giant. Everyone in the group was struck by the company's impressive campus and facilities. We had a good meeting with one of the company's founders and discussed global outsourcing trends as well as factors leading to Infosys's success.








I also should at least give a mention to the traffic that we've been facing in each city. It is incredibly bad throughout the country. In the picture below, an elephant is contributing to the back-up. This traffic is one of the most visible signs of the lack of infrastructure in place to meet surging economic growth. For our little study group, it's meant lots of time in the bus and lots of time to get to know each other!!

From the Infosys meeting, we headed to the airport to fly to Delhi and arrived at our hotel late at night.

Day 4 (part 2): alumni dinner

The dinner was a lot of fun and a good opportunity to catch up with alumni in Bangalore. Here's a pic!

Day 4 (part 1): GMR and Sequoia Capital

Day 4 brought the group to GMR, a visionary infrastructure group that is working to construct the roads, airports and power facilities that the country greatly needs. The company also makes great effort to give back to the community in any way that they can. We spent over 2 hours with senior management, including the group's billionaire founder and CEO, Mr. G.M. Rao. Here you can see Ishan speaking with Mr. Rao and securing his 5th job offer of the trip. It was another quality meeting for the group where we delved into business culture and ethics as well as what it takes to run a family business efficiently.

Next, we travelled to Sequoia Capital, the world's foremost Venture capital firm. A couple of partners at Sequoia joined 2 of their portfolio company entrepreneurs for a great panel discussion. We discussed many issues around VC in India, entrepreneurialism in India and the Indian market. We then broke into smaller groups for more personal discussion.

Tonight, we're having a VC/alumni dinner, so it should be another packed day.