'The opportunity is in the 30-40 bn pages being printed every year'

He also led the HP company-wide initiative on digital imaging

appliances, infrastructure and services. Popularly known as VJ inside the

company, he joined HP in 1980 as a research and development engineer for pen

plotters. The man who narrowly missed becoming ex-HP boss Carly Fiorina's

successor shares his views on a range of issues with Editor Ibrahim Ahmad.

Excerpts:

Why Vyomesh Joshi was not made the big boss of HP, after Carly Fiorina

moved out?



I think Mark is a great guy and I really believe it is the best thing that

could have happened for the company. I am very happy. What I think is that HP is

a big company with multiple business. Mark, as CEO of NCR, has run a complex

organization similar to HP, and I think he can help us.

Do you feel disappointed?



No. I don't think that way. I have been with HP for 25 years. I love this

company. I feel that the way HP works is all about great people. Every single

day I get up in the morning, I want to make a contribution. If I could make a

difference, that is what it's all about.

And what makes 'a difference'?



First of all, I love the imaging and printing business. I served as the

manager for ITG in 2001 and we have continued to grow since then. If you look at

2001, we were a $19 bn company; now, we are $24 bn. Earlier, we were working on

10% operating profits; now, we are making 13-15%. This growth makes me excited.

I also realise that most successful big businesses turn complacent and slow

down. That's when I started the transformation of ITG. I felt that when we are

strong, it is the time to get transformed in the business.

Where do you see the impact of imaging and printing devices on business?



The first impact is that we have been very fortunate to have very high

growth in the business part. The information explosion will help us figure out

how to tell the stories. Say, in digital photography, it would help us tell the

story of a family. For a small and medium business, how you tell the story when

you are growing. I think the business we are in, that of storytelling, would

become a very big opportunity for us.

Vyomesh Joshi

The second thing is that we are into inkjet technology business where we

develop material, where we develop nanotechnology for inkjet cartridges; it is

actually a micro fluid device-we will be able to take our core technology and

apply it to different fields.

The third thing is the explosion of the Internet. Because of imaging and

printing capabilities, we would like to directly connect to the Internet. Every

imaging and printing device would have an IP address. We will be able to solve

customer problems in a very different way. In my view all the trends which I

talked about would help us grow; that is why I am so confident of my business

growth.

You have also talked about home printing. Do you think as a customer with

budget constraints, such as in markets like India, printing photos at home would

really take off?



I think the important part is convenience. I would give you a simple example

of the Polaroid, which was not of excellent quality. But because of instant

gratification, that of getting the photograph right there and then, it became

very popular. So the value proposition of instant gratification of printing the

photograph right there, in a very easy-to-use fashion, will make people in India

also use it. But the important part is that it has to be affordable, fast, and

easy to use. So that is what we are looking at, even in emerging markets. I

believe it makes sense to be affordable in countries like India and China.

Let me extend that a little bit. You said imaging and printing would

become part of people's lives. Can you explain further?



Let me take you back to 1995 and give an example. During our study on why

people take pictures, we found that it is all about story telling. When you sit

down with your grandma, she will tell you how things were thirty years ago. That

is storytelling. That has changed now. It is now done through photos albums. You

flip through pictures. My technology will help you to tell that story very

differently. So, basic storytelling about life and history, and sharing it with

friends and family is never going to change. So, with digital photos, with

camcorders, with Internet, this will become part of life. Because connecting to

family life and sharing is a part of human life.

Even taking photographs, physically, and putting those in albums?



Absolutely. And we are going to make it so easy and affordable that everyone

will do it. It is very fascinating that whenever there is a fire people always

take their albums with them. Because they are so precious and they can tell

their stories.

In this whole game plan, what else do you have in store?



Think about what I have told you about storytelling by the consumer. For

small and medium businesses you want to look like a big company but don't have

the resources to be like a big company. If HP technology can help them in

storytelling, they can do the same thing, even better than a big company. I

believe printing is one way of storytelling, depending on how you use technology

to do this. Let me take a different example. We have started working with

DreamWorks. Jeffery Catsenberg, who is the CEO, bought a company in England. As

DreamWorks is based in Northern California, in LA, he used to travel every week.

He asked if we have a way by which he won't have to travel. Not like

videoconferencing, but something more real. Like you are sitting there and I am

here and we are talking. So that is what we worked on together. We are calling

that whole technology a big launch, where you can see us providing customers

technologies where they need not travel.

So, is printing and imaging emerging as a new service opportunity?



Yes, if you think about big companies, say, Ford, as a partner. Ford says we

have lots and lots of printing requirements and we do not know how much we will

spend. Second, can you manage the product? We have done a lot of work around the

world where we evaluated their printing environment, telling what the customers

need. If they want to manage their IT department, they can do it and we have a

lot of great tools to manage this environment. We are leaders in terms of how to

manage your network and how you keep track, at substantially lower costs,

improving productivity. If they want us to manage the whole environment, we also

do that. It is a very big opportunity for HP and we would continue to do that.

How large is this business for HP?



For imaging and printing business, I can't tell you the exact figure, but

it is something more than $200 mn contract. These are worldwide numbers.

What about manufacturing in India?



We think that we should be where we can be world class and...

...You think you cannot go world class here?



I am not saying that. I am saying that it is the approach we take,

evaluating all the countries-India, China, Russia, and Western Europe. Let me

make one thing clear-from the imaging and printing point of view, clearly,

there is lot of opportunity on the consumer side-big opportunity on the

commercial side as far as Indian businesses and enterprises go. I just want to

make sure that for imaging and printing, the growth is just not only on the

consumer side. You would see also many opportunities...