SUBMITTED BY

BTech + MBA

ACHYUT CHANDRA

NEIL MATHEW

SHIKHAR AGNIHOTRI

SHOUMIK GOSWAMI

UTSAV KHURANA

SUBMITTED TO

DR ANJANI KUMAR SINGH

CORPORATE ENTREPRENEURSHIP

AT WIPRO

Wipro Limited was incorporated on 29December 1945, in Mumbai by MohamedPremji as 'Western India VegetableProducts Limited’ later abbreviated to'Wipro'.

It was initially set up as a manufacturer ofvegetable and refined oils in Mumbai,Maharashtra, India under the trade namesof Kisan, Sunflower and Camel.

The company logo still contains a sunflowerto reflect products of the original business.

In 1966, after Mohamed Premji’s death, hisson Azim Premji returned home fromStanford University and took over Wipro asits chairman at the age of 21.

UTSAV

Wipro Ltd. has a long history of innovationand intrapreneurship.

Wipro’s first brush with corporateentrepreneurship could be traced way backin late seventies when it started itsInformation Technology business.

In late seventies, foreign corporations suchas Coca Cola and IBM pulled out of India.This was due to the unfriendly policies ofthe Government of India headed by PrimeMinister Morarji Desai. Because of it,Wipro recognized that there was a marketfor Indian vendors of computers andsoftware.

In 1980, an energetic, committed team of15 professional R & D and marketingmanagers was brought together and in asmall laboratory at the Indian Institute ofScience (IISc) Bangalore.

The team developed the first Indian minicomputer based on Intel 8086 chip. A yearlater, the company released Wipro 456, aspreadsheet program similar to Lotus 123,a top seller in the U.S. at the time.

WIPRO focused on the Indian Marketbuilding computer systems and softwaresfor corporate clients. It acquired licensesfrom global hardware and software giantsand with the help of the improved 100member strong R&D team, they woulddevelop architecture suitable to the IndianMarket.

However, the 100 member R&D team faceda situation when their expertise was nolonger required by any division in WIPRO.

The concept of “Lab on Hire” wasconceived by Dr. Sridhar Mitta, the thenR&D Chief at Wipro to leverage thetechnology competencies developed overone decade by providing R&D services toerstwhile technology partners like Intel,Sun, Motorola and Cisco.

This way, it captured more value for thecompany by putting to use an idlingresource group profitably. Over the yearsthe R&D services business grew rapidly andbecame one of the main revenue earnersfor Wipro Technology.

SHOUMIK

Another most recent example of corporateentrepreneurship at work in Wipro washow the internal quality initiatives weretranslated into a quality consulting practicewith over 150 `customer touch' Six Sigmaprojects under way. The internal qualitymeasurements had set the benchmark forother companies.

Leveraging the lessons from its internalquality initiatives, the company developeda copyrighted Six Sigma for softwaremethodologies. Though the QualityConsulting business of Wipro started in2002 and was just a little over two-years-old, but the division was fast emerging as akey contributor to the company's revenues.

WIPRO ENTREPRENEURIAL CULTURE

WIPRO followed meritocracy basedsystem (a system in which thetalented are chosen and movedahead)

WIPRO was a very open organizationcompletely devoid of politics.

WIPRO nurtured an entrepreneurialculture.

WIPRO allowed free space forinnovation to take root and flourish.

While some of the ideas got the supportof the top management and were takento the market within the umbrage ofWipro, some other ideas did not getblessings of the power that be resultingin spin outs.

NEIL

There were a large number of corporatespin outs like:

• Mindree Consulting started by AshokSoot and Subroto Bagchi

• e4e Labs started by Dr. Sridhar Mitta

• Exodus started by K.B. Chandrasekhar

• and many others.

This was another problem. Topprofessionals left WIPRO in pursuit oftheir entrepreneurial ambitions.

In their first attempt to retain theirprofessionals, they offered them variousincentives like offering stock options.However, the wealth made millionaires ofseveral WIPRO employees, and gavethem the financial security they neededto step out.

In their next attempt, the company puttogether a more structured InnovationProgramme to take most outstandingideas to the market on a ongoing basis.

This was more practical and structuredprocess. The innovation would gothrough various stages of approval andcommitments of funds. An idea has tomeet certain goal sets before goingthrough the next stage of support. Thereis also “financial measurement system”to enable Wipro staff share the gainsgenerated by their ideas.

It formed the Innovation Council (formedof senior managers) in late 2000s to takemost outstanding ideas to market.

This led to higher hit rates and costeffectiveness.

Role of the Innovation Council is toevaluates proposals and to providesinternal funding for the best ones.

The Innovation Council is made up ofsenior managers but the ideas aregathered ‘bottom-up’. It is the engineersand project managers who are immersedin the technical issues and generate thecreative long-term ideas.

Council’s job is to choose the best onesand sponsor the same, based on itsanalysis of how the resultingtechnologies and components will, inturn, provide value to its corporatecustomers or integrated into theirproducts.

SHIKHAR

At the root of this Innovation Programmelie both individual and collectiveattempts to find answers to some criticalquestions:

• Is WIPRO attracting the best talentand keeping the talent challenged and contemporary?

• Is the innovation creating higher valuefor our customers?

• Are we doing low risk experimenting to filter out “good” ideas from the truly outstanding ones?

• Are we taking positions on technology developments and building skills to anticipate tomorrow?

• In the process of work within the organization are we continuously eliminating redundancy and non-value adds?

Azim Premji, Chairman of WIPRO:

Wipro culture all these years is brought tosurface in the form of a slogan:

Innovation is Wipro, Wipro is Innovation

There has been a constant focus on benchmarking and upgrading in Wipro. It keenlyfollows the companies like Hindustan Lever,Infosys and GE and tries to adopt the bestpractices. Wipro continuously comparesitself with those considered best on variousfunctions.

WIPRO tries to understand the process andsee how you can bridge the gap or exceedthe gap. This is a continuous process.

ACHYUT

WIPRO has councils, consisting of all ourfinancial, human resources, quality andmarketing people. They typically meet 4 or5 times a year, one or two days each time,and significant part of the agenda is sharingwhat the other is better at. So thatimprovement of one division is quicklytransferred to the rest of the company.

WIRPO is using processes like six Sigma tokeep on fine tuning, reducing cost,increasing productivity and maintaining andimproving consistency in the quality of ourexecution.”

This trait of Wipro to continuously explorenew ideas and seek change proactivelyhelps company transform itself severaltimes to face the future better by wardingof any threats and capitalizing on theemerging opportunities.

THANK YOU

REFERENCES

News Article (Live Mint) http://bit.ly/1GLphBR

Business Essay (UK Essays)

http://bit.ly/1C4CeFD

Online Article (VIKALPA)

http://bit.ly/1C4D4lR