A chemical engineer from the IIT, Delhi, and an MS in chemical engineering from Cornell University, US, Padmasree Warrior joined Motorola, Inc. in 1984. Having held several leadership positions in the company, she is today one of the few women worldwide to have moved into the top slot so rapidly. Now executive vice-president and chief technology officer of Motorola, her responsibilities include leading a global team of 4,600 technologists, prioritising technology programmes, guiding creative research from innovation through early-stage commercialisation, and influencing standards and roadmaps. She is also technology adviser to the chairman and to the board’s technology and design steering committee. In a recent interview with tele.net, Warrior spoke about the opportunities in the Indian telecom market, and discussed global technology trends, 3G and Motorola’s future thrust areas. Excerpts…
What, according to you, are the telecom technology trends worldwide?
The global telecommunications market is growing rapidly. Continual innovation in technology is throwing open new markets for handset manufacturers and operators.The year 2005 was a trend-setting year, with a record 245 million mobile phones being shipped during the fourth quarter.The total annual volume increased to an all-time high of 810 million units as against 681 million units in 2004.
The major factor driving this growth is the burgeoning demand in emerging markets such as India, Africa and China.These emerging markets accounted for half of the total worldwide sales in 2005.Mobile phone shipments are expected to further increase by 14.8 per cent to 930 million units during 2006, which promises bright future prospects for telecom companies in practically every market.
How do you perceive the Indian telecom market in terms of business opportunities?
India plays a vital role as one of the largest recognised growth markets in the world, and is a high growth market for Motorola.Mobile penetration is growing at the rate of approximately 4 million subscribers a month, making India one of the world’s fastest growing telecom markets.
According to DoT’s recent annual report, the Indian telecom sector has witnessed foreign direct investments of Rs 104.08 billion in the last 14 years, which is behind only the power, oil and refinery sectors. This augurs well for telecommunication companies like Motorola and presents significant business opportunities in an extremely competitive market environment.
What are Motorola’s plans in terms of increasing its presence in the Indian telecom industry and where would its focus lie?
India has the highest growth rate and yet a vast mass of unconnected/potential subscribers. Hence, the Indian market possesses tremendous opportunities for us and, as I mentioned before, is a high growth and emerging market for us.
We have, in the past few months, embarked upon several new initiatives that reflect our commitment to this market.These include the unveiling of new handsets for the mass market and the highly affordable C11x series as well as the premium SLVR and RAZR series of handsets.There has also been the announcement of a new management team headed by Firdose Vandrevala, chairman, Motorola India. To reiterate our policy of “connecting the unconnected”, we have undertaken pioneering initiatives to ensure the affordability of handsets across India’s urban, semi-urban and rural markets. Our strategic alliances with ITC ?? e-Choupal and Hariyali Kisan Bazaar ?? to extend our rural reach and our partnership with GE Money to provide India’s first ever consumer financing scheme for handsets are some of our broader initiatives aimed at making our range of mass market and premium handsets accessible to India’s burgeoning consumer base.
What would you consider as the high points of Motorola’s growth? How would you place it vis-a-vis competition?
Motorola is creating a revolution in every realm of the mobile handset business. Be it pricing (C11x series), slim design (SLVR and RAZR), colours (RAZR in four colours), form and functionality (the V3i with i-tunes) ?? none of our competitors can boast of such a varied product portfolio, suited to the tastes of every segment of the market. Our iconic product, the RAZR V3x handset, has been recognised by the GSM Association as the “Best 3GSM Handset, 2006”, which is a matter of great pride for us. Aspirational, iconic and accessible products combined with robust sales, marketing and distribution initiatives are the benchmarks that set us apart from the competition.
What have been the difficult areas to tackle?
To make the products and services available through all parts of the country and cater to the tastes of varied sections are some of the key challenges that any multinational company like Motorola has to face. However, we have taken innovative measures to tackle these problems.Through our continuous R&D efforts, we have been successful in delivering products suited to Indian conditions (for example, the robust nature of the C115 and Hindi language SMS). We have also entered into alliances with Bharti, eChoupal and Hariyali Kisan Bazaar to extend our reach across rural India.
What, according to you, will drive 3G acceptance?
Any new technology at the introduction stage goes through a hype phase, and 3G has surpassed that. It is real and presents a significant opportunity in the market.
Delivering the services and functionality that ensure a compelling, easy-to-use experience for consumers will be the key factor in driving 3G acceptance. Keeping this in mind, companies need to focus not only on the underlying technology of 3G but also on how content is rendered to the consumer. For example, creating a best-inclass mobile music solution means ensuring the total experience from identification, selection, payment, download, playback, and audio quality ?? all these deliver something that the consumer could never have imagined. Besides this, the operators’ tariff plans (providing attractive and competitive pricing), handset cost and security of the value-added services provided will be decisive factors in enabling 3G acceptance.
What is the future after 3G?
Innovation in technology is a continuous process. We believe in a world of seamless mobility and it will not be long before a world of wireless technology becomes real.Consumer acceptance of 3G would enable creation and adoption of even better breakthrough technologies in future.
What are the company’s future thrust areas?
Underlining Ed Zander’s (Motorola’s chairman and chief executive) commitment to India, our thrust areas this year would be to connect the unconnected parts of the country and extend our reach across India’s rural, urban and semi-urban markets. We will continue to roll out and launch path-breaking, robust products for the Indian market along with expanding our manufacturing footprint in India.
What challenges do you face as CTO of Motorola worldwide?
I believe that the greatest challenge for anyone in a role like mine in a large technology company is to reduce the complexity of numerous technologies and distill issues to the essence. I like to keep things simple and crisp. It requires tremendous intellectual bandwidth ?? to absorb a lot of deep, fast-paced technical information, to understand global market dynamics, to maintain close customer interaction and synthesise all this input into a few key business strategies.To sort through a series of data, trends and disruptions and prioritise what is important is very challenging. I love that aspect of my job.
My goal is to drive innovation and commercialise technologies faster into products and revenue. This requires combining technical IQ, business IQ and entrepreneurial IQ.
