An innovation expert from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) will be visiting the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A), in November to promote the importance of user-based innovations in creating successful companies.

“India and Indians residing worldwide have a wonderful record as innovators and entrepreneurs. I believe users tend to be the real developers of many important products. Recently, research by my colleagues has shown that many new companies are started by users who become entrepreneurs. Learning about how user innovations foster the creation of successful new companies will be very useful information for IIM students and others in India,” says Eric von Hippel, professor and head of Innovation and Entrepreneurship Group at the MIT Sloan School of Management and professor of Engineering Systems at MIT.

It will be his first trip to India, which he also intends to use “to forge closer contacts with my colleagues at IIM-A, who have very similar research interests”.

The lecture is part of a two-week long ‘Inventors of India’ workshop by the Centre for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE) at IIM-A. About 70 inventors and innovators of all ages and technical background are expected to be present at the event. Premier institutes could also be called to participate at the workshop.

“Eric will participate and may give the inaugural address at the workshop. In addition, he will interact with the faculty and students and explore possibilities of collaborative research. Apart from visiting some grassroot innovators, he will interact with our incubatee companies as well. Several things are being planned and we are quite excited about his visit. Also, we may ask institutes like National Institute of Design (NID) and Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad (MICA), to pitch in,” says Rakesh Basant, chairman of CIIE and a professor at IIM-A.

An expert in Principle of Developing Economics, Eric has made two of his books available openly on his website at no cost to the reader: Democratising Innovation, published in 2005 by the MIT Press, and Sources of Innovation, published in 1988 by Oxford University Press. Leading companies in the world have used practical methods based on his research.

Hippel is also expected to meet grassroot innovators at SRISTI, an NGO founded by Anil Gupta, a professor at IIM-A. Incidentally, Gupta too would be lecturing at MIT as part of the Amy Smith’s International design and development course on July 16-17.

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Pune, Jan 5: Scene I: A Balasubramanian, high-profile director of the prestigious Symbiosis Institute of Management Studies (SIMS), Pune, which is regarded as one of the best private business schools in the country, and flaunts a 100 — Position record percent Suspended after a student complains about what he agacés. He is a director and revolt finally recedes.

Scene II: The season is the placement. The Institute can not be without head and authorities to make a choice. Enter Mudholkar Ranjeet, 24, graduated in computer science and a student SIMS von’96 the classroom. A year after his separation from service graduation Mudholkar chucks his work with the Birla AMC Capital Limited, New Delhi and agrees with The Sims as director.

Gasp you like, roll their eyes and I wonder what went wrong. Thus, the child is soon rubbing shoulders with the management gurus and the top brass in the sector? Is he a genius or a boy, he is … SIMS is abuzz.

His courses are at a whisper in Art Gallery Mudholkar appointment, the rules we have not yet been violated because he was the unanimous choice of the symbiosis for the body, but some students and teachers are perplexed.

Indeed, Mudholkar academic record is not just World Class, sources say he was “ one of the best students .”“ One of his succès”touted round that Ratan Tata to participate in a seminar in Mumbai.

Few are under discussion. No student or teacher publicly criticized the new director. Indeed, the subject is taboo and there is a watchful eye on each eye, each time you question. “ Yes, it is a Go-Getter. It has big names on campus. Yes, it is in order, OK.”Mudholkar, but it is a “ type-of-Service”zu his alma mater. “ In fact, I am strongly with SIMS. Money plays no role,”he said. He prefers to call the discipline itself a soldier SIMS and said it is already in the momentum of things “.”

The Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A), in an affidavit filed before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, has said that the unilateral decision of the Union ministry of human resources development regarding fees to be charged by IIMs does not seem to be a step in the right direction.

The affidavit, filed after the apex court served notices to the six IIMs on April 8, asking them to clarify their stand on the fee-cut issue, puts on record the IIM-A’s willingness to sort out the issue through a process of dialogue.

“We have not gone to the court proactively. The affidavit places our views on record in answer to the notice and not filing it would have limited our options. We are, however, not a party to the PIL,” said a source in the IIM-A.

The affidavit has three components - the Position Paper prepared by the faculty, the resolutions passed by the IIM-A Society and the Board of Governors recently, and the fact that the institute is in a process of dialogue with the ministry.

Dons feel that the affidavit clarifying the institute’s willingness for a dialogue will create an atmosphere that will help the process initiated by chairman NR Narayanamurthy during the board meeting here on April 3.

The affidavit said the fee-reduction order has to be seen not in isolation, but in the larger context of many other decisions by the ministry that threatened the autonomy of the institute.

It has also said that the notification on fee reduction “violates the time-honoured process of the fee being decided by the Board of Governors and that it is not necessary to reduce fees to make management education more affordable to the less well-to-do sections of the society.”

Meanwhile, the Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta faculty council filed an application before the Supreme Court, praying for an order impleading it as a respondent in the fee-cut case already pending before the apex court.

ZEE Network has announced an in-house reorganisation possibly in the wake of Zee TV President, Ms Apurva Purohit’s plan to quit.

The company says the move is aimed at job enrichment and offering higher responsibilities.

Mr Sunil Khanna, CEO, Zee Turner, would take over from Ms Purohit. Mr Khanna has been with the Zee Network for 10 years, occupying various positions, and has a track record in distribution and marketing. Mr Khanna, an engineering graduate from IIT Kharagpur and management graduate from the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, is a marketing professional having worked in various marketing positions before joining Zee.

Mr Ashwini Yardi, Business Head, Zee MGM and Zee English, will assist Mr Khanna as head of programming for Zee TV.

Mr Khanna is expected to take over formally at Zee TV in Mumbai after Ms Purohit’s service period ends on 31 January.

Mr Dheeraj Kapuria, at present heading operations of Zee in the US, will take over as CEO of Zee Turner from Mr Khanna. Mr Kapuria’s deputy in the US, Mr S. Venkatasubramanian, will take over from him.

Mr Sunil Rohra, head of the UK operations and Mr Pushpinder Singh, head of the Africa operations, will report to Mr Kapuria, a press release said.

“This re-organisation is a result of our learning from an in depth internal communications exercise in which I met most of the managers within the network to assess the width of in-house talent. It was truly satisfying to reaffirm that we have an extremely talented pool of people in-house. I believe by enriching their portfolios, they will lead Zee Network into the New Year with greater vigour and effect,” the release said quoting Mr Subhash Chandra, Chairman, Zee Network.

Some of the executives have been given additional responsibilities. Mr Abhijit Saxena, currently handling international business (Asia-Pacific) and syndication of programming, will handle Zee English, Zee MGM, Trendz, Smile TV and FX Channel as business head. Mr Yogesh Radhakrishnan, in addition to his current portfolio of Zee Cinema and Zee Music, will also handle Premier Cinema, Action Cinema and Classic Cinema.

Bangalore, March 16. COGNIZANT Technologies has been the biggest recruiter in the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore’s (IIM-B) campus recruitment programme this year, notching up 24 of 180 students.

“They made 30 offers, but were accepted by 24 people and this is the first time that an IT company has made so many offers,” said sources in the institute. This year’s batch was snapped up in record time, according to the institute. In just two days, all the offers were made and accepted.

At the IIMs, ’slot one’ companies (chosen by the students) are given the first two days to conduct their placement process. This year, there were 14 companies that made 100 plus offers on day zero. These include Dresdner KW, Capital One, McKinsey Consultants, AT Kearney and British Petroleum. The ’slot two’ companies were P&G, HLL, ICICI, ABN Amro and Cognizant Technologies.

Officials, however, refused to reveal the average salary, as the details “are yet to be computed.”

Students of the Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad are set to give the IIMs a run for their money if the placement pattern for the current year is any indication. Barely three weeks after an IIM Ahmedabad student set a record by bagging an annual salary package of Rs 67 lakh, an ISB graduate broke the record by accepting a package from an international company for Rs 80 lakh.

The five-year-old ISB did not release the name of the student.

Its deputy dean Ajit Rangnekar said in a statement, “The placement results for 2005 have been phenomenal. The number of offers our students received this year jumped by 26%, with the number of international offers increasing by 55%. Consultancies were the biggest recruiters followed by information technology and financial services.”

Of the 273 students in the 2005 batch, 251 participated in the placement process. They received 344 offers, of which 333 were lateral and 31 international.

While there was a growth in international offers, the number of Indian companies offering international assignments too has gone up. Companies like Birlasoft, ITC Infotech, Satyam, Mindtree Consulting and RPG offered international positions to ISB students in countries like the UK, Australia, US and Singapore.

With a representation of 19%, ISB’s Class of 2005 had the highest number of women students across B-schools in the country. Out of the 52 women students in the class, 48 participated in the placement. The highest offer made to a woman this year was Rs 20 lakh, an increase of 53% compared to Rs 13 lakh in 2004.