Sujit John
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Business editor in The Times of India, Bangalore
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Articles by Sujit John
AI is making young engineers forget to think
Mausam is worried. The professor and founding head of the Yardi School of AI at IIT Delhi said this is the first year he has found some IIT students not thinking when doing their project work. They depend entirely on AI. When something goes wrong, they cannot explain why. “They don't have the depth of understanding needed to know what is not working, why it isn’t working and what they should do. And I am sure the problem is going to get much worse as time goes on,” he said.
AI won’t replace automotive engineers, but change them
On this page, we’ve said many times that the car is no longer just a machine built from mechanical parts. Sensors, software, data and algorithms are becoming as fundamental to a vehicle as brakes, steering and the powertrain. But what does this mean for automotive engineers? Caleb Munigety, head of enterprise AI at Bosch India, told us on our podcast last week that it means a career built around one discipline will increasingly have to stretch across several.
Blackstone’s GCC in Bengaluru anchors fresh $50bn India plan
BENGALURU: Blackstone has launched a global capability centre (GCC) in Bengaluru, its first outside the US, underscoring India’s growing importance to the investment firm’s global operations. The move comes as the firm looks to double its India investments to $100 billion over the next five years from about $51 billion to date.
Powering StanChart’s transformation Original
Standard Chartered Bank once had multiple payment systems talking to one another across markets, creating more opportunities for errors, operational risks and uneven customer experiences. Engineering teams in India helped build a single platform to bring those systems together. The payoff goes beyond smoother payments: the bank can now introduce new technologies without having to replicate the work across a patchwork of systems.
How India talent powers the obesity drug care Original
It’s an epic battle today between Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly in the high-profile and rapidly growing diabetes and obesity drug market. Both companies have large global capability centres (GCCs) in India that are becoming increasingly vital in this battle, as competition extends beyond the medicines themselves to how quickly the companies can develop, analyse, launch and supply them.
Who says AI is killing services Original
Romal Shetty is betting that AI will give Deloitte so much more work that it will need thousands of additional employees. The opportunity, he says, lies in reaching customers that the firm, one of the world's largest professional services networks, could never afford to serve before. We met the CEO of Deloitte South Asia in his Bengaluru office, overlooking the city's racecourse and one of its biggest golf courses. He's a cricket fan, and there's signed memorabilia around his office.
Why fundamentals and systems thinking are so important Original
In this AI age, Gopichand Katragadda says the most important engineering skills have not changed as much as people think. What has changed is the scale and speed of what engineers can now do. But the core of engineering, he says, is still built on fundamentals, systems thinking, and disciplined execution.
The Bengaluru brains behind Intel’s global chips Original
Nearly two decades ago, Intel’s engineers in Bengaluru helped put six processing cores onto a single piece of silicon. The result was Dunnington, a chip launched in 2008 for the powerful servers that run business applications. Today, the work coming out of India reaches into processors designed to put AI inside laptops, with engineers helping decide how much those machines can do without draining their batteries.
There’s a long runway for IT services in the AI age
Tuesday saw share prices of software and IT services companies surge by about 5% early in the day, apparently because of the talk around AI regulation and slowdown. That could quickly reverse, and we’ve seen this volatile behaviour for some months now. Investor money has been going into those building AI models and providing the chips and hardware needed to train the models.
In India’s fintech boom, security is the foundation
If you want to understand the extent to which AI and automation are being used by cyber criminals, here’s a stark statistic: Fortinet’s external attack surface management solution saw close to 4.6 billion stealer logs last year, and that number increased by 79% in the first half of this year. These are attempts to take data out of trading networks.
As AI scales, the network becomes critical – and India is helping build it
Every time an email is sent, a video is streamed or a payment is made online, invisible traffic is moving through a vast network of machines. Routers and switches sit in the middle of this digital highway, deciding where pieces of information should go and moving them from one machine to another. For decades, that has been Cisco's world.
Infosys CEO Salil Parekh's legacy: Doubling revenue, securing $100 bn deals, and AI strategy
Salil Parekh has wrapped up his tenure as CEO of Infosys after achieving impressive revenue growth and securing significant contracts. When Salil Parekh took over as Infosys CEO in 2018, the company was grappling with boardroom turmoil that had shaken investor confidence.
In this AI age, engineers must go deep and wide
When Tinku Malayil Jose’s team was developing a smart glass recently for a customer, they ran into thermal issues. The device was heating up. The battery engineering team ran checks and found nothing wrong. The thermal test team said everything looked fine. Yet the device was occasionally failing. When finally multiple teams came together, they realised a certain combination of temperature and humidity was causing the problem. “I'm from Kerala.
India’s AI race turns on trusted infrastructure
For a while after ChatGPT made the world sit up, all of the excitement was around AI models. Today, as enterprises and startups look to build AI solutions and implement them at scale, enormous amounts of compute capacity has become necessary. And much of the discussion now is around building trusted, resilient and secure AI infrastructure.
They've created a cancer drug candidate for Mayo Clinic
Mayo Clinic in the US is often described as the best hospital in the- world, and is one of the most renowned medical research organisations. For years it has been working on a difficult cancer target known as GIPC1 - a protein that drives the growth and treatment resistance of cancers like pancreatic, breast, ovarian, colo-rectal, gastric, lung and kidney. It's been called a non-druggable target.
From early home training to frontier research in number theory
They are brothers. They are math geniuses. Arul Shankar, 39, contributed directly to the foundational research that won his PhD advisor, Manjul Bhargava, the 2014 Fields Medal, widely called the 'Nobel Prize of Mathematics' because it is the highest honour a mathematician can receive. Ananth Shankar, 34, contributed directly to the foundational breakthrough that led to Jacob Tsimerman winning the Fields Medal this year.
AI is writing the code, engineers still need the math
Every time someone generates an image using Nano Banana or Gemini, a small star-shaped mark appears in the bottom right corner, declaring that the picture was made by a machine. It is, for now, visible. But regulators are already pushing for something far trickier: watermarks that cannot be seen, cannot be cropped away, and cannot be resized out of existence.
India’s the remote manufacturing brain for GlobalFoundries
News Technology News India’s the remote manufacturing brain for GlobalFoundries Trending GlobalFoundries does not manufacture chips in India. Yet, engineers in the country monitor, troubleshoot and improve the company’s semiconductor factories in the US, Germany and Singapore, often detecting problems before employees inside those plants begin their shifts.
AI labs proving why IT companies still matter: Infosys CEO Salil Parekh
Trending File photo: Salil Parekh, Infosys CEO BENGALURU: When Salil Parekh took over as Infosys CEO in 2018, the company was grappling with boardroom turmoil that had shaken investor confidence.
AI is teaching factories to think
For more than a century, industrial automation worked through fixed instructions. A sensor detected a condition, a control system applied programmed logic, and a machine responded. AI is beginning to change that model by allowing factory systems to learn, predict problems and adjust operations as conditions change.Blake Moret, chairman & CEO of Rockwell Automation, says this shift could transform how factories are designed, commissioned and operated.
AI frontier: Acquiring people's knowledge before they retire Original
News Technology News AI frontier: Acquiring people's knowledge before they retire Trending Indian manufacturers are now using artificial intelligence to preserve critical institutional knowledge. Companies like JSW Group and Sun Pharma are building AI systems to capture expertise. These systems answer questions based on years of operational experience and data. Parle Products uses AI to enhance its vast consumer distribution network.
When AI writes code, engineers must learn context Original
AI’s now writing 70-80% of code in many organisations. And if it isn’t there yet in some, it will get there. All humans have to do is give the system a prompt in our language. This phenomenal ability of AI is transforming what’s expected of engineers.
They’ve built an AI stack for America’s infrastructure Original
News They’ve built an AI stack for America’s infrastructure We’ve been tracking Balaji Sreenivasan and his venture, Aurigo, for a couple of decades now. The last time we wrote was six years ago. Since then, the company has grown, particularly the India centre, it has more US govt customers, and it’s now using AI to transform its solutions, using its access to 20 years of construction data across about half-a-trillion dollars of capital programmes.First, a little recap.
Core engineering is coming back, specialise deeply Original
News Technology News Core engineering is coming back, specialise deeply Trending AI-generated image for representation purpose A company in the US that makes machines to cut wooden logs had a dangerous problem. Its blade rotated at 2,800 to 3,400 revolutions per minute.
Youngsters must learn fast, build often, and communicate better Original
News Technology News Youngsters must learn fast, build often, and communicate better Trending For students and young professionals trying to build careers in this age of AI, Srikanth Velamakanni has a blunt message. Do not depend only on degrees, coding skills or today’s tools. Learn to think from first principles. Build things. Communicate better. Go deep in mathematics if you want to do serious AI research.
FORGET THE AI MODELS; India is building the products
News Technology News FORGET THE AI MODELS; India is building the products Trending India may not have an OpenAI of its own, but global giants are building the AI products of tomorrow from hereFor months, the conversation around India’s place in the AI race has been dominated by what the country lacks. It has no OpenAI, no DeepMind and no home-grown frontier model capable of matching the world’s most powerful AI systems.
Think of your careers as many short loops
The career, as most people have understood it, is dead. Not the working life – that endures – but the old architecture of it: the single long arc, the carefully chosen specialism, the thirty-year ascent through a recognised hierarchy. Sanjay Menon, executive VP and MD of Publicis Sapient India, wants professionals – particularly young ones – to bury that model and stop mourning it. “In the past, people have thought about careers as one long loop that lasts 25 or 30 years,” he says.
How to make agentic AI dependable at scale
Sujit John and Akhil George The conversation around AI in enterprises has moved decisively beyond experimentation. The new challenge is no longer how to build an impressive proof-of-concept, but how to deploy agentic AI at scale in ways that are reliable, governed and capable of delivering measurable business outcomes. That was the central theme of a discussion we had last week.
How a global retailer and banker are using AI
Sujit John At the Nasscom GCC Summit last week in Mumbai, we had a discussion with two leading GCC heads – Ankur Mittal, CTO and MD of Lowe's India, and Praveen Kumar, CEO of Barclays Global Services India – on how much of a foundational shift AI is, and the impact the technology has had. Both said the shift is fundamental, and is forcing companies to rethink customer experience, employee productivity, business processes, and the nature of talent.
Why GCCs must move to shape enterprise outcomes
We've been saying that global capability centres (GCCs) in India are fast becoming integral to the global enterprise. In the AI era now, their role is changing sharply. The next generation of GCCs will not merely deliver solutions, they will also have to shape enterprise outcomes, redesign work, orchestrate ecosystems, and accelerate AI adoption at scale. That's what we heard in a Times Techies discussion last week in partnership with Accenture.
AI’s next road test is physical Original
The next big leap in AI may not come from systems that generate text, code or images.
They’re taking DPI to the world
“Is-se aap logon ko kya milta hai?” (What do you all get out of it?). That’s what Delhi bureaucrats sometimes ask this group of people who are going around the world – from Brazil to Morocco and the Philippines – helping countries replicate the success of India’s Aadhaar, UPI, and other digital public infrastructure (DPI). Many in this group, including those building and upgrading the open-source technology modules that go into DPI, are doing it pro bono.
How to make agentic AI dependable at scale Original
The conversation around AI in enterprises has moved decisively beyond experimentation. The new challenge is no longer how to build an impressive proof-of-concept, but how to deploy agentic AI at scale in ways that are reliable, governed and capable of delivering measurable business outcomes.That was the central theme of a discussion we had last week.“We are at a fascinating tipping point,” Sunil Jose, head of India for Workday, the $10-billion cloud-based enterprise software company, said.
India central to EY’s AI strategy: Truncale Original
Union Minister of Commerce & Industry Piyush Goyal and EY (Ernst & Young) Global Chair and CEO Janet Truncale during a meeting to exchange views on India's consistently growing role in global supply chains.
How to transform AI pilots into biz impact Original
Enterprises are not short of AI ambition. They are short of the hard plumbing needed to turn ambition into business change. That was the consensus in a discussion that we had in association with Publicis Sapient, as part of a series called ₹AI that’s built to deliver’. The problem, they said, is rarely the lack of AI experiments.
Why companies may soon need ‘AI archaeologists’ Original
News Why companies may soon need ‘AI archaeologists’ The most valuable AI skill of the next decade may have nothing to do with coding.
THE FUTURE OF AI IS TEACHING machines how businesses work Original
News Technology News THE FUTURE OF AI IS TEACHING machines how businesses work Trending Christian Klein, CEO of SAP, in New Delhi on Tuesday. Klein said he had an hour- long talk with Prime Minister Narendra Modi where the two discussed India’s 2047 development ambitions, AI-led improvements in agriculture and infrastructure, workforce skilling, and stronger economic ties between India and Europe.
Cloud-first, AI-led GCC reimagines global banking Original
Global capability centres (GCCs) were once offshore delivery arms but are today being rebuilt as cloud-first, AI-led transformation engines that own platforms, capabilities and outcomes. That is the direction in which Cognizant and Citizens Bank are taking the bank’s GCC in Hyderabad. Citizens, one of the oldest financial institutions in the US – founded in 1828, and with $230 billion in total assets – has built the centre with Cognizant under a BOTT model: build, operate, transform and transfer.
GCCs are India's golden egg, the best thing happening in country today, but Delhi policy analysts don’t understand it Original
News Technology News GCCs are India's golden egg, the best thing happening in country today, but Delhi policy analysts don’t understand it Trending GCCs: Serving the world from India In the current economic dullness, there's a remarkably vibrant sector that Delhi policy wonks often miss, and misunderstand, because its best manifestations are in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Pune, and because our export categorisation masks it.
GCCs in India: Exports rise 2.4x, employment 2x over six years
Sujit John We have said for some time that GCCs (global capability centres) are India's best story. But to tell that story well, it's important to have good data. Unfortunately, not everyone in the industry agrees on how to define a GCC, or how to estimate the size. The biggest bone of contention is whether to include the IT services subsidiaries of companies like Accenture, Capgemini and Cognizant in the category.
The AI boom is forcing firms to confront their data chaos Original
News Technology News The AI boom is forcing firms to confront their data chaos Trending Most companies believe the biggest challenge in artificial intelligence is building smarter models.
GCCs: India’s golden egg
In the current economic dullness, there’s a remarkably vibrant sector that Delhi policy wonks often miss because its best manifestations are in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Pune, and because our export categorisation masks it. It’s global capability centres (GCCs), the tech and operations centres of MNCs, of which there are some 2,400 in India today employing over 3.5mn people. And every week, one or more is being established in India. Read full story on TOI+ Facebook Twitter Linkedin END OF ARTICLE
The rise of women in finance leadership in India: First it was in banking, now it is in GCCs Original
News Technology News The rise of women in finance leadership in India: First it was in banking, now it is in GCCs Trending There was a time, not too long ago, when India’s banking sector stood out globally for an unusual reason: the number of women at the very top.
Think of your careers as many short loops Original
The career, as most people have understood it, is dead. Not the working life – that endures – but the old architecture of it: the single long arc, the carefully chosen specialism, the thirty-year ascent through a recognised hierarchy. Sanjay Menon, executive VP and MD of Publicis Sapient India, wants professionals – particularly young ones – to bury that model and stop mourning it.“In the past, people have thought about careers as one long loop that lasts 25 or 30 years,” he says.
Delivery hubs to AI reinvention hubs Original
Last week saw a lot of discussion around GCCs – at a Nasscom conference, and in sessions organised by Times Techies. There was much talk about how GCCs must look at AI, and what it means for India’s talent Why GCCs must move to shape enterprise outcomes.We’ve been saying that global capability centres (GCCs) in India are fast becoming integral to the global enterprise. In the AI era now, their role is changing sharply.
How India’s helping this US retail giant move from using AI to running on AI Original
News Technology News How India’s helping this US retail giant move from using AI to running on AI Trending Andrea Zimmerman & Prat Vemana What a coincidence that the technology heads of two of the biggest general merchandising companies in the US today are Indians, and both Tamilians! One of them – Suresh Kumar, global chief technology officer and chief development officer at Walmart – has been featured on our pages several times.
Indian engineers rewrite the code for control systems Original
News Technology News Indian engineers rewrite the code for control systems Trending MORTEN WIEROD, CEO, ABB: Breaking ground for yet another plant in India. A facility that’s just been launched in Bengaluru will focus on producing UPS’s for data centres. Data centres is today ABB’s fastest growing business We met Morten Wierod, CEO of the $33-billion electrification and automation group ABB, at a brand-new factory the company has set up in Bengaluru.
Rethinking the digital core of an enterprise: AI is beginning to test the limits of legacy systems Original
News Technology News Rethinking the digital core of an enterprise: AI is beginning to test the limits of legacy systems Trending Traditional enterprise platforms that powered the last three decades of digital transformation are now facing a defining moment. As AI shifts businesses from transaction processing to decision-making systems, companies are grappling with whether their ERP and CRM backbones are becoming constraints, or can still serve as foundations for the AI era.
This Keralite helped build the world's most powerful computers
Akhil George and Sujit John Thomas Zacharia has over the last few decades helped reshape the global computing landscape – including, improbably, the fortunes of a company he does not work for. Zacharia, senior VP of strategic technical partnerships and public policy at AMD and based in Austin, Texas, is one of the more consequential figures in the story of how AI moved from academic curiosity to industrial force. That story begins not in Silicon Valley, but in Kerala. Zacharia grew up moving.
From pilot to platform: Why AI must run through the enterprise Original
News Technology News From pilot to platform: Why AI must run through the enterprise Trending AI will create little value in companies if it remains trapped inside labs, and isolated proof-of-concept projects. Value comes when workflows are reimagined with AI, and true transformation comes when AI’s embedded into the enterprise fabric as part of a CEO-led cultural change.
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