Conversation, Collaboration, PartnershipFourth Edition: November 29th & 30th 2012, Mumbai

The Design Public Conclave is a high-level conversation among a select group of thinkers, decision-makers and opinion-leaders, all interested in using design and innovation for the public good.

It is increasingly being recognized that large-scale social change requires broad cross-sector coordination and collaboration. While the isolated interventions of individual organizations may be independently successful, the complex nature of the kinds of problems we see in India require complex, multivariate and holistic solutions. People increasingly have faith that innovation approaches may make breakthroughs in some of India's largest and most intractable problems, including water, sanitation, energy, health, urban management and rural development. However, there is still a struggle to understand, define, and actually do innovation, as well as to identify areas where collaboration can make a difference. This is what Design Public makes possible.

The Conclave will address four of the largest challenges in India that could bring about economic growth and improved quality of life: Smarter Cities, Nimble Agriculture, Equitable Water and Post-Grid Power. These are all complex challenges that cannot be overcome by any one sector of society, and require a multi-player, participatory and creative approach to solution-creation.

In the past, the Conclave has received support from IBM, Google and the Gates Foundation, and has attracted participation from decision makers in public, social and private sector organizations. Arun Maira, Sam Pitroda and Samir

Brahmchari have all spoken at this event, along with, for example, Ashok Alexander and Shanker Annaswamy, respectively the heads of the Gates Foundation and IBM in India. International design and innovation experts such as Reto Wettach (Germany), Scott Burnham (Holland), and Niels Hansen (Denmark) have also given key note addresses.

Along with coverage from our media partners Mint Newspaper and Livemint.com, the Conclave has received detailed and favourable coverage in major news sources in India and around the world, including the New York Times, The Hindu, The Economic Times, The Business Standard and Tehelka, as well as independent pieces by bloggers. The event also enjoys a large social media halo. Samar Halankar of the Hindustan Times described the event's fast-paced panels as gripping and 'continuously compelling.’

Conceptualized by Dr. Aditya Dev Sood, the Design Public Conclave brings together Innovation experts, design thinkers, academics, and members of the press debate the question of Growth through Innovation. The carefully curated participation of this Conclave ensures that the dialogue remains focused and meaningful, and minimal distinctions between panelists and audience members ensures a rich and engaged dialogue.

July 2012 | Published by Center for Knowledge Societies

Coomaraswamy Hall at CSVMS (formerly the Prince of Wales Museum)

November 29th, 2012:

Word of Welcome: The Trajectory and Momentum of Design PublicOpen Dialogue: Ideas and Approaches to InnovationDesign Thinking and Systematic Innovation – A Case Study

Breakouts into Challenge Tracks

Mutual PresentationsOpen Dialogue: Innovation and the Public InterestClose of Day One

Cocktail Reception

November 30th, 2012: The Conclave

Day Two Kick Off

Panel: Innovation and the Public InterestPanel: Conversation as InnovationPanel: Talking, Doing and Teaching Innovation

Lunch

Read Out from Smarter Cities DiscussionRead Out from Water and Sanitation DiscussionRead Out from Nimble Agriculture DiscussionRead Out from Post-Grid Energy Discussion

Concluding Plenary

Challenge Track Innovation Workshops

Challenge Track One: Smarter CitiesChallenge Track Two: Nimble AgricultureChallenge Track Three: Water and SanitationChallenge Track Four: Post-Grid Energy

Draft Agenda for the Conclave

July 2012 | Published by Center for Knowledge Societies

The Design Public Conclave has had a more far-reaching effect than we could ever have imagined at the outset. Widespread interest from private corporations, social sector organizations and government, as well as media coverage of the event, has helped both to facilitate the conversation on India’s innovation path, as well as yielded concrete, actionable results that contribute to India’s overall innovation ecology. These include:

The Creation of the Bihar Innovation Lab, a collaborative initiative between the Government of Bihar, NGOs, BMGF and CKS, which will focus on developing rural healthcare innovations in the state.

The Conceptualization of the Lab-School for Innovation, which provides theoretical and practical training in design and innovation processes.

The Creation of a Consortium on Smarter Cities, which will take the learnings from the breakout session forward in a spin-off event, in collaboration with IBM, sponsors of the third Design Public Conclave.

The Creation of the Chaia Innovation Accelerator, which will aim to provide knowledge, training, mentorship, and access to funds and other resources to entrepreneurs developing innovations for the public interest.

Accomplishments from Prior Editions Dr. Sood...contends that the discipline of design thinking can help in solving complex problems, such as those related to good governance and administration.

MINT NewspaperMarch 2011

Dr. Aditya Dev Sood of the Center for Knowledge Societies will host Design Public, a conference on innovation in the public interest.

New York TimesOctober 2011

It’s easy to believe Sood when he says societies can be seeded with a culture of creativity and innovation through the establishment of consortiums, partnerships and alliances.

Business StandardApril 2012

July 2012 | Published by Center for Knowledge Societies

By 2025 India will add 215 million to its cities, and 38% of the country’s total population will be concentrated in cities with a population of more than 1 0 0 , 0 0 0 . T h i s r a p i d urbanization in both larger metropolises as well as smaller cities poses unprecedented challenges that often have to do with governance, traffic, security, energy and building. These challenges accelerate the need for investments in scalable and futuristic infrastructure. It also necessitates a dialogue between all the different stakeholders, decision makers and implementers, to align their interests and goals, and collaboratively envision and plan a Smarter City. Against this background, IBM, a global technology and innovation company, as well as leader in the Indian Information Technology Industry, is anchoring the Smarter Cities track at Design Public. It will explore the use of cloud-based information systems in order to ensure smoother traffic flows, regular power supply and the tracking of crime.

Smarter Cities

CKS has developed the concept of Nimble Agriculture as a means of meeting the needs of small and marginal farmers who often have small pieces of land less than 2 hectares in size. The term refers to agriculture that is smart, light and agile: smart in its use of resources, light in its impact on the environment, and agile in its ability to rapidly respond to different market and environmental stresses. While most organizations tend to focus on very specific elements of agricultural production, our approach is to look at the entire range of agricultural services from the point of view of the small farmer. This includes ensuring access to seed, fertilizer, irrigation techniques, automation processes, mobile device integration, market information and more. We aim to bring organizations like NABARD, IFFCO and the Gates Foundation, among other major agricultural companies and policy makers, to participate in this challenge track session.

Nimble Agriculture

Large parts of India already suffer acute shortages in clean drinking water as well as water for domestic use, not to mention water for industrial and agricultural use. This is due, in l a r g e p a r t , t o t h e mismanagement of water and the lack of proper recycling technologies. While there are efforts being made better manage our water resources, these are widely distributed and often in misalignment with each other. We will focus on enabling better coordination between these, especially to bring clean drinking and domestic water to the urban and rural poor who suffer most from their lack. This involves tackling the problem through more evolved recycling technologies, better water delivery processes, as well as focused legislation and policy changes. It also necessitates the formation of new kinds of partnerships and alignments between public and private sector organizations in order to bring a multi-pronged and more comprehensive solution to this large challenge.

Water and Sanitation

The conventional power grid in India is unable to meet the increased demand for power due to both infrastructural and procedural inadequacies. Its limitations in reach as well as efficiency result in large parts of both urban and rural India having limited or no access to electricity. To overcome challenges of access as well as impact, we need to look deeper at sustainable, nano solutions to power generation, as well as look at new domestic appliances that do not require the same threshold of power. This challenge track will examine the problem from different perspectives and seek to develop new models of micro-grids and community-generated power, tackle the redesign of the existing grid, and examine new ways of harnessing forms of sustainable energy. It will explore the idea of Smart Grids, which can incorporate multiple sources of new renewable energies such as solar and wind power, and interact locally with distributed power sources.

Post-Grid Energy

We believe that this fourth conclave will yield rich possibilities for future work, and create new practical, collaborative outcomes that help further refine the innovation ecosystem in India. Owing to the simultaneous presence of policy makers, funding agencies, execution agencies and innovation experts, we expect no less than four major initiatives to emerge from these deliberations.

Real Innovation Outcomes

The four challenge tracks at Design Public Four will address key areas where innovation is necessary for new possibilities to emerge in India. In order to allow maximal collaborative thought and dialogue, we will soon be opening these tracks for discussion on the Design Public group on LinkedIn and on related web media, so that they may be better taken up in meetings on the 29th of November, prior to the Conclave Plenary.

Challenge Track Brainstorming Sessions (November 29th, 2012)

July 2012 | Published by Center for Knowledge Societies

Expected Partners

Sponsorship Framework

We are already in dialogue with several Indian and international agencies who may be involved with this event:

Event Partners: Centre for Internet and Society, India@75, Headstart Foundation, MINT, Footprint

Institutional Partners: NESTA (UK), Young Foundation (UK), Premsela.Org (Holland), Dutch DFA (Holland), Open Knowledge Foundation (Finland).

Academic Partners: TU Delft (Holland), Aalto University (Finland), Tata Institute of Social Sciences (Mumbai), Industrial Design Centre at the Indian Institute for Technology (Powai), Indian Institute for Human Settlements (Bengaluru).

Dialogue Partners: The American Center, The British Council, The Embassy of Sweden, FAO, Omidyar Network, Gateway House, State Bank of India, IFFCO, CAPART, NABARD.

The Design Public consortium is now soliciting support and sponsorship from organizations, agencies and corporations that are interested in engaging thought leadership around these topics. We aim to work with premier organizations, who can guide the further development of this agenda. Sponsorship opportunities follow a tiered structure: Lead Sponsor, Associate Sponsor and Event Sponsor.

Benefits of Stakeholdership in Design Public include:

. Opportunities for networking with influential and senior representatives from different sectors.

. Opportunities to define the innovation agenda for one of the challenge tracks.

. Access to all the Challenge Tracks for your senior leadership.

. Opportunities to form consortia with key individuals and organizations around the challenge track.

. Access to an innovation training workshop taught by global innovation experts.

. Representation of senior leaders in panel discussion.

. Social media attention on your own innovation practices.

In addition to Sponsorship, several other modalities of engagement have been created, including

. Event Partner: Collaborative investment of time, effort, knowledge and networks.

. Institutional Partner: Contributions in kind and of content.

. Academic Partner: Student volunteering and fellowships for students and faculty.

. Dialogue Partner: First-time representation from interested institutions.

Please contact Ayesha Vemuri (ayesha.vemuri@cks.in) for more information on sponsorship and partnership opportunities.

Members of the Advisory Board

Arun MairaMember, Planning Commission

Bhairavi JaniExecutive Director, India at 75

Aparna Piramal RajeIndependent Writer, Business & Design

Aditya MishraFounder, Headstart Foundation

Sukumar RanganathanManaging Editor, Mint

Sunil AbrahamExecutive Director,CIS

DelhiBangaloreMumbai Patna

Visit our website: www.designpublic.in or email us at designpublic@cks.in for more information. For constant updates, visit our blog (www.designpublic.in/blog) and join the conversation online.

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