Frog Entry Into India: A Milestone?

When Frog, earlier Frog Design, announced its formal entry into India through the appointment of a country general manager, there was both excitement and disappointment among the small but active design community in India. Frog has always been one of the most respected design consultancies in the world and its entry into India is a recognition of Indias potential as a market and as a talent pool. But there was one question that bothered this community: The way it chose to enter the country. It appointed an IT industry executive to lead the India ops. Indraneel Mukherjee, whom it hired as the country GM, comes from Symphonyan IT and analytics companynot a design company. What is more, it was silent on when it could open its studio in the country.

Contrast this to its China strategy, where it entered some 5 years back. It actually moved a Frog person into the country to start the operationfor the record, he was an Indianand started with a studio, right from day one.

Yes, in China, we started with design while the delivery was done outside; in India, we are starting with delivery and design will follow, says Sudip Nandy, CEO of Aricent Group, the parent company of Frog, which like the design firm, changed its name recently, replacing the suffix Technologies by Group, interestingly to convey this new positioning of a firm that offers integrated design and tech capability. It started in India 2 decades back as a pure telecom technology firm and has changed both names and ownerships multiple times to reach where it is today.

Nandy says Indias capabilities in IT, business services, and even engineering are now proven. The next opportunity is to combine design with technology to offer a proposition that would help clients create better experience for their customers. So far, the promise of IT and BPO has been efficiencyhow you run your business in a cost effective manner, with less resources, and possibly shortened process cycles.

Nandy even has a name for it: Innovation as a service. So far, we have talked of innovation in business and we have talked of efficient service delivery as 2 different things, he says. He says there is a strong need for this as the product design, for example, is a combination of both.

Look Ma, No Studios for this Design Powerhouse

But when will the studio start?

The concept of studio itself is becoming irrelevant, says Nandy.

The studio was based on the premise that you put individual talented designers in a closed, isolated place and they would create the designs. That did not take into account the power of collaborationthe value that it could bring in, he explains. He says the new world requires both collaboration among geographically dispersed designers as well as between designers and engineers/developers. In effect, what it means is that India could well be the place where this new model of working could be shown to the worldthe new Frog location as opposed to Frog studio, as Nandy puts it.

Are the designers comfortable with the idea? Well, most of them are; not because we tell them but they themselves have seen what value collaboration could bring, he says admitting that some of the designers are still coming to terms with this new reality.

Is a combined end-to-end proposition better than the specialized best of breed approach that has been the practice so far? Well, these ideas are like changing fashion trends. Today you say a combined approach is better; tomorrow you say, no, you need more focused approach; and day after you are back to where you started, says a consultant. He gives the example of the experimentation of combining design with technology in the interactive advertising space as well as in consulting. At one time, there were so many firms that mushroomed to offer digital design; today, barring a few, most of the top agencies are ad agencies. Someone may be a little better in one media or the other. But they are not a separate breed. What has increased is the role of technology in advertising, he says. Where are the hundreds of pure-play digital design firms that mushroomed at one time, he asks. He even points to the EDS unsuccessful attempt to integrate AT Kearney with itself as an example of the failure of this approach. Sure, most IT services firms today have far better consulting capabilities that help them in their core work that is IT; but it is not the same thing as consulting capability, he says.

But India has a track record of changing some of the age-old business practices. The shared services model was a small example, till it came to India as offshoring. Today, no one questions that.

China & India:

Diametrically Opposite

That debate (combined versus specialized offering) may continue for some time. On the more practical side, however, Frogs different strategies in entering China and India are understandable. China, traditionally, has been a manufacturing power, especially strong in consumer products. While low cost manufacturing has been its USP, of late, the larger companies that compete globally have now come to realize that they cannot grow further by just imitating the designs. They need to invest on design. This growing realization is the opportunity that Frog leveraged in China. Almost half of our customers in China are global companies from China while the rest are mostly Chinese companies who want to design for the Chinese market, informs Nandy.

India has very little of the first communityproduct companies who sell globally. As a local market, it is emerging but definitely way behind China. India is probably where China was about 5-6 years back as a market, says Nandy.

The logical thing for the company was to start delivery first even as it is exploring the opportunities in design. That does not mean there are no opportunities. At any point of time, there must be 2-3 Frog designers visiting India, on client work, he says.

Of course, India is a nascent but potentially big market for digital design, which accounts for half of Frogs revenue. The company is already working for some banks and telecom services companies in the Indian market. Earlier it was done from other locations. Frog plans to shift that to India.

But what Frog is really betting on is the new integrated opportunityhow it can combine design and development and offer a value where the whole is greater than sum of parts. And there are 2 strong reasons for carrying out that experimentation in India. One, India is a strong services hub for the globe. And the ecosystem is there. Two, India is a fairly good microcosm for the emerging countries. A successful Indian experiment can be ported to the rest of the world more effectively than a Chinese experiment.

It is an experiment worth trying. And when you have your genesis in India, why not?