New Strategy Chief At Kolkata’s Adamas Group Plans AI Labs, Industry MOUs, Consulting Arm

He has just been roped in by the Kolkata-headquartered leading educational group-RICE Adamas Group as the Chief Strategy Officer & Chief Supply Chain Officer. He is also the Head of Consulting—Strategy & Business, Adamas Tech Consulting. With a formidable experience, spanning over two decades at IBM Consulting and also 8 years in core manufacturing with overall 28 years of industry experience, Rudra Shankar Roy is an acknowledged top-grade strategist. He brings in expertise in a number of delicate domains like E2E consulting, business transformation, supply chain, Lean Six Sigma etc. Speaking to Bizz Buzz, Roy, an alumnus of St. Xavier's College, shares his plans, strategies and priorities for taking the Kolkata-based educational group to the next level, aligning with the needs of the industry

What prompted you to leave your over 28 years of industry/consulting life (core manufacturing and consulting) and join a predominantly education group?

I have served more than 350 clients in the world of consulting across the globe over all these years and I've been travelling with a different kind of business value proposition in all these years. I felt that that the legacy of my industry expertise as a global subject matter expert, in the area of industrial products, in areas of supply chain, process transformation, automation, and all the kind of growth opportunities, should be utilised and leveraged in the education sector, because these are real needs of the education sector.

I think unless and until education groups, students and education sector, as a whole, understand the real needs of the industry, they won't be able to map it, in terms of the curriculum. Supply and demand need to match. While the demand comes from the industry the supply is being provided by the institutions. So that's the reason I thought this will be a step forward for me in terms of my new journey, and this also, matches the work that our Prime Minister, Narendra Modi is doing for Viksit Bharat. Unless and until we skill and reskill our students or the faculty members in accordance with the new era, the need of the industry- in terms of the processes, in terms of the technology, in terms of the adoption of AI and so on, all other efforts will end in futility. This is what has prompted me, to take active part in nation building exercise. This is what prompted me to join Adamas.

What would be your new role in Adamas Group? What are your priorities to Adamas Group to the next level?

My role, I would say, will be Chief Supply Chain Officer, Chief Strategy Officer for the Adamas University, and I will also be heading the Consulting Business, Head of Consulting for strategy and business for the Adamas Tech Consulting. This is also in alignment, with the vision of Chairman of Adamas Group, who is also Chancellor of Adamas University- Prof Dr Samit Roy. This, mind you, is an important decision which, the group has taken in terms of aligning the industry with education.

How would your long experience in industry and corporate help and come in handy to carry out your new role and responsibilities?

The amalgamation of the industry and education with the enablement of technology is going to play a pivotal role today and this will be multi-dimensional. And making this alignment smoothly and seamlessly is going to be my priority at the Adamas Group which would enable us to take it to the next level.

In the past, we had witnessed that most of the technology companies abroad had started their own universities. I don't want to name them, but these are quite clear and well known. Unfortunately, India hardly has any such example. Adamas Group has grown from being an academic institute to a leading University. And now that same university, in turn, will enable the students to meet the demand of the industry. And this is this will start from the university to run a consulting business. We at Adamas Tech will be playing a pivotal role and this is a first of its kind initiative in India, where an university is getting into constituting, technology consulting, to be precise. So it’s other way round. While outside India, tech companies build up universities, here is an university that is foraying into technology consulting, business consulting, process consulting, enterprise consulting and so on. The university has taken this decision of building the workforce from Adamas knowledge center campus in Kolkata. This will be the first of its kind in India.

My role at Adamas will be to help shaping up the industry-academia center of excellence, where there will be representation of industry stalwarts in academics, who will be part of the board of studies, academic council and so on, using my experience and network in the industry.

They'll also be part of, various, curriculum setters and various industry alignment programmes. Planning and moves are afoot to firm up various MOUs with the big corporate houses across the world for setting up of industry specific labs. We will also try to bring in works, which will be game changers, here. In this context, Bengal will play a crucial role, given its academic standards and talent pool.

Would your entry into the Kolkata-based educational group mark the beginning of a new journey into new territories and new verticals for Adamas Group?

My entry into the Kolkata-based educational group will mark a new beginning for the University from different dimensions, because I'm going to bring lot of industry stalwarts, SMEs, subject matter experts, who will be interacting with the Adamas group--with the faculty members, with the students. They will upskill them, reskill them in the various, aspects that is really needed as a part of the, national education policy and the industry alignment and serving the client. So we plan to make industry-ready students and faculty. All the students of our University will be now industry ready consultants. If someone is offshoring their work to India or anywhere, they can also experience what is happening in the client industry labs or the client industry experience center. That is what we are going to build up in terms of new, technology enablement like AI, digital workforce, Gen AI, cloud computing, quantum computing, cloud security.

Where would you like to see Adamas two-three years down the road?

We will certainly be the number one university, not only in Bengal, but, also in the country. We’ve recently got the NAC A rating. So we are going to have a NAC A++ soon, and that's the plan for 2030. We are planning a lot of design thinking workshops in the next few months where we will be revealing many plans of what Adamas will be in 2030 or say, two to three years from the now. Adamas will be taking part in lot of philanthropic works. There's a need for us to support the community through the enablement of the various technology enablers. We will be accepting all the ideas. No idea is bad for us. So, we will be doing a co-creation of the work and with collaborations. We won't be working in silos. It will be a teamwork.