Enormous innovation in FinTech space is taking place in India, says Andrew Vaz, Chief Innovation Officer, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd. Here he shares with BusinessLine , Deloitte perspective of current innovations happening in the country.
Where does India’s innovation figure amongst global innovation?
From a Deloitte perspective, India is one of the top innovation systems globally, in conjunction with countries such as the US, Australia, the UK, the Netherlands and Israel. There is a significant ecosystem growing within India to serve its market place. Now the Central government encouraging ‘Make in India’ some players should graduate into the global marketplace.
It is certainly a driver for 3D printing and additive manufacturing though such drives. We should see increased investment by the financial and venture capital community in India. This is may help the start-up sector and should be robust going forward.
What is the innovation scene among the big and small companies in India?
It is more defined by industry than size of business. We see enormous activity in the FinTech space across banking and financial services. Also large conglomerates are leveraging areas like blockchain and cognitive for a variety of use cases from loyalty to trade chains. From an Industry standpoint financial services is taking the lead, but in areas like Robotic Process Automation (RPA), we are also seeing enormous activity in the global captive centres where increasingly back office functions in human resources, finance and operations are being replaced by software bots.
India has had a long history of IT. In your view, what kind of innovation is expected to drive it to the next level?
Given the strong history and talent assets, we see innovation continuing but focussed on key exponential technologies including cognitive, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), blockchain and IOT with significant experimentation in a variety of industries.
In IT innovation, what are the key areas relevant for India?
Robotic Process and Cognitive Automation, Blockchain, IoT and Machine Learning (AI / Cognitive).
How is Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu strategizing innovation relevant for India?
We believe that businesses worldwide will be facing a new paradigm of disruption brought up by digital transformation. In such a scenario, India serves both as a test market for the world, giving the large volume of the middle class and its buying power, and at the same time serves as talent hot bed for new ecosystems to evolve. In addition, Deloitte focuses on areas which would be relevant across the world, especially for its global clients, and India forms a critical part of that narrative.