10th India Digital Summit

by Manas Mukul · Published February 17, 2016 · Updated September 26, 2019

10^th INDIA DIGITAL SUMMIT – IAMAI

India Digital Summit

The biggest annual gathering of Digital leaders in India – 10^th India Digital Summit (IDS) hosted by – IAMAI – Internet and Mobile Association of India was held on 9^th and 10^th day of February of 2016 in the heart of our national capital, New Delhi, at the Lalit hotel. The event was a unique opportunity which saw many huge names, the smartest minds in market from the Digital and Marketing Ecosystem along with some new ones that have started surfacing and started knocking on the doors of success.
Continuing with the current government initiative of ‘Start-up India Stand-up India’, the event covered a vast range of topics aligning with the government’s agenda and with the current technological and digital space in the country. The top CEO’s and CMO’s addressed a variety of topics including;

Smart Cities Mission: A step towards Smart India
First Steps to Entrepreneurship – launching of a start-up
How health tech is on a roll?
Why Food tech industry is moving towards a new ceiling?
What the state of internet in rural India?
What is the future of Internet?
Education Tech – the revolution has added a new dimension to the education industry
Financial Inclusion – Advancing financial inclusion in India
How to scale up start up: Analyze, Attract, Implement and Grow
Travel Tech – The road ahead
What’s the state of Internet and women in India: technology to aid for gender parity
Mobile touch points across brand marketing
Marketing automation: Transforming the way the marketers work
How India is moving towards a cashless economy
Apps Development innovation required in India
Building a killer team – Ways to Attract, Hire and retain the right people
How is the technology giving a leap to financial institutions
The power of content marketing to drive Digital Media Campaigns

Deep Kalra, MakeMyTrip with Amarjeet Singh, OLX

The Lalit provided the perfect setting for the event where the complete Hotel was covered in the flavours of India Digital Summit. There were four major halls where the leadership talks and discussions were taking place and a designated Exhibitors section. This time IAMAI – IDS gave an exciting opportunity to young budding entrepreneurs to come and present and pitch their ideas and start-ups in front of a panel of investors and market leaders.

Chairman TRAI at the 10th IDS

The Exhibitors section had stalls of the major sponsors explaining their key offerings but the buzz was majorly generated by the ‘Startup Zone’ which was again a glorious opportunity for some start-up to set up their stalls and explain to visitors what their offerings were. It was great even for the new technology curious visitors as they were complimented with food and tea coupons depending upon the passes they were holding.
The Summit commenced with a welcome address by Kunal Shah, Founder & CEO, FreeCharge & Chairman IAMAI. It was followed by many speakers in different auditoriums including Umang Bedi, MD Adobe, Shri Ram Sewak Sharma, Chairman TRAI, Dinesh Agarwal, Founder & CEO Indiamart, and Deep Kalra, Founder MakeMyTrip. The first day concluded with the CEO’s dinner which posed as a terrific opportunity to connect and network with the key figures in the business.

Dinesh Agarwal of Indiamart at 10th IDS

Second day witnessed equally huge names from the digital ecosystem. Murugavel Janakiraman, founder and CEO CONSIM and Shri Rajeev Chandrasekhar, MP Rajya Sabha got the day underway. Nandan Nilekani graced the occasion with his presence and strategic inputs on how he is shaping the future AADHAAR and its inclusion in every aspect of life and hence economy. The day also saw the likes of Dippak Khurana, CEO Vserv, Amit Jain, CEO Cardekho, Kirthiga Reddy, MD Facebook India, Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Founder Paytm, and Rajan Anandan, VP & MD Google SE Asia & India. The valedictory address was given by Shri Jayant Sinha, MoS Finance government of India.

Nandan Nilekani at 10th IDS

The second day concluded with the 6^th edition of the India Digital awards which definitely glamorized the event along with recognizing the hard work of the techies for their contribution in the Digital universe.
Excerpts from the 10^th IDS:
“Every Entrepreneur is a Social Entrepreneur in India. Popularity shouldn’t be a metric for success. Entrepreneurs should create value so that the VCs chase them. Our Favourite sport is jumping to conclusions. Great Entrepreneurship should not be like coaching classes, don’t always look for mentors.” – Kunal Shah, Founder & CEO, FreeCharge & Chairman IAMAI.

Nandan Nilekani with his mission on AADHAAR

“Adobe is changing the world through digital experiences. The real differentiator is Customer Experience for products and services. Every Experience should be consistent and continuous. Experience is the new brand and customer journey is the new product.” – Umang Bedi, MD Adobe.
“Software should be made available to everyone as commodities for us to grow. Digital India vision can only be achieved if there would be connectivity all across infrastructure and internet.” – Shri Ram Sewak Sharma, Chairman TRAI.

Dippak Khurana of Vserv at 10th IDS

“Scaling up is very individual and intuitive. Accelerators and Alliances are two very different things. It’s about repeat usage (churn) not new usage. Don’t try to provide solutions to everyone, be focused. It’s not about the ideas… It’s about the execution and Execution is a series of small ideas.” – Dinesh Agarwal, Founder & CEO, IndiaMart
“It’s totally about perseverance with your startup. Don’t have a plan B when you embark on your journey of a Start-Up. MakeMyTrip’s success is because of its TEAM. Please be aware of competition but don’t obsess over them. Competition is equally important…If u don’t have competition that means you are in the wrong space”. – Deep Kalra, Founder MakeMyTrip.

Irfan Khan Ceo Blogmint at 10th IDS

“Language support is very crucial for Internet in rural India. Affordable smart devices and affordable data is the key to take the Internet to rural India. We need the REASON for the person to come on Internet in rural India. Problem is content generation in regional language and because the content is in alien language there is very low discoverability Ambiguity is a key issue when it comes to translation. There should be standardization in taxes across country to support Internet in rural India. Consistency in network, spectrum n infra require for proper Internet in rural.” – Internet for Rural India.

Blogmint at work

“Constantly remind people of your mission and right Co-Founder is critical.” – Dippak Khurana, Founder & CEO VServ.

Chaaipani stall at StartUp zone

To summarize the couple of days of Digital summit; It focused on how digital transformation can help and give a tremendous boost to the Indian Economy both in urban as well as rural India, which was in coherence with the current government’s initiative of ‘Start-up India Stand-up India’.
I would like to take this as an opportunity to thank IAMAI and Blogmint for making it possible for me to attend the event on both the days.