Bangalore the Ideas City

Rodin In Cubbon Park

By Harish Bijoor

I live in Bangalore. I love Bangalore. But that’s not why I am saying what I am going to say right now.

I do believe, if New Delhi is the political capital of India, Mumbai the commercial and Kolkata the ‘kultural’, Bangalore is indeed the Intellectual capital of India.   We are a city of ideas. A city of thinking people who think the past with equal aplomb as we think the present and the future.

While most cities today are very besotted with the present, we straddle every aspect of the past, present and the future, in our own true-blue Bangalorean way. Never mind the fact that we live treadmill lives, like everyone in the bog cities does, but we get off at times as well. And that’s the time we think. And sometimes act.

Bangalore today is all of 87 lakh people living cheek to jowl with people from 25 different Indian states and some 39 nationalities that have made Bangalore India’s biggest expatriate island. Bangalore is therefore a true-blue amalgam city of sorts. We are the melting pot city in India, if there ever is to be one, where different cultures, tastes, and most importantly ideas mix, rub shoulders and blend. This then is an ideas-laboratory of sorts. A place where new things are thought out. A few ideas flourish and most die of course. In many ways an idea is a sperm. It lives like one and dies like one as well. Very few germinate.

Bangalore today is really an ideas city. It has been one for a while now. Only thing is we have not noticed enough of it, and not made enough of it as well. This is an innovative city. Innovative at every level. A city of entrepreneurs as well. A lot of credit for this entrepreneurship streak needs to be given to the lakhs of new settlers we have welcomed into this city from every part of India and the world at large.

Let’s first credit every land entrepreneur who came in from Andhra and indeed the immediate neighboring states around us. Lets credit every retailer, whether it be in the space of grocery ‘kirana’ or gold retail, many of whom came in from Kerala and again our very immediate neighbor states. I can go on listing out terrains that cover technology, ITES, IT-end to end services, Biotech, manufacturing, pharma and literally every other idea vertical that has made this city what it is. A city of ideas. A city that has encouraged idea start-ups from the realm of the humble Momo-cart to high end embedded systems that run nations and their many programs.

The basic DNA of this city, from the bottom end of the corner 'kirana' grocer to the top-end of the IT-preneur is a city that is led and bled by ideas.  Look around, and it is not difficult to spot an ‘ideapreneur’ on the prowl. This guy has been welcomed into the fold of this very accommodative city. Never mind where you are from, all are welcome. There is no jingoism here. If your idea is good, you will survive here. And thrive.

The ideas that run here are both small and big. Decades ago we started with Pub-entrepreneurships. The theme pub started in Bangalore really. A space pub called NASA, a car pub called Black Cadillac, and 485 other variants happened here. The food revolution is a reality in Bangalore today. Every food-entrepreneurship is an idea whose time has come. Koramangala today boasts of the highest density of restaurants per square kilometer in India for sure, with its 458 offerings. The Café started in Bangalore with VG Siddhartha’s Café Coffee Day, and now we have 2950 of them belonging to a myriad set of brands all over India. The IT end-to-end services enterprises happened here and sprouted, just as did the BPO outfits that litter our lives, From bottom end to top-end, this is surely an ideas city.

One downside though. The idea sperms are many, but few meet and mate the money that is needed to ramp up the humble idea. One wonders where the moneybags are burying their moneys. Let’s dig.

In a way, if I were to look for an image icon that would represent Bangalore for what it is, it would not be the Vidhana Soudha, which we use so profusely. Neither would it be the visual of the “Namma Metro”.

Instead, I would land up right in Paris, run into the Musee Rodin and fly out Auguste Rodin’s “The Thinker” and plant it out here right outside Cubbon Park! Sorry Parisians! This is the spanking new thinking city of the spanking new world. Bangalore!

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Harish Bijoor is a Brand-strategy specialist & CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.

Twitter @harishbijoor

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

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South India changing......

The South is a special place…..

By Harish Bijoor

The South is a special place. For more reasons than one. Setting aside the emotional one, let me explore the rational argument.

And please! For a start, let me clarify this is no jingoistic comparison of region to region. Instead, it is a clear positioning of the potential of the 4 South Indian states of India at large. If there is any comparison attempted in number terms, it is merely to give a perspective to  an otherwise dull number.

The South is an exciting place. It is home for a start to 251 million Indians. The sex ratio remains healthy. The total population number of the 4 South Indian states makes it a region that contributes   21   percent to the population of India.  If our fertile young people out here work harder, we are going to maintain this number contribution on an even keel.

In terms of employment, the South is a robust environment. The South equally exports its people to literally every part of the world, just as the South attracts the best of talent from every nook and cranny of the world. To that extent the South has emerged a mixed market. What was once a language-centric domination of the local people, has given way to multiple sets of communities co-existing happily. You will find a Kenyan rubbing shoulders with a Bengali, just as you will find a Punjabi rubbing shoulders with a Kannadiga in Bangalore. The lines of language are blurring, and the old jingoism of language is giving way to a more common adoption of Hindi as a national language. In more ways than one, Hindi is emerging the alternate language of every one of the Metros in the 4 South Indian states.  This in turn, is ironing  out the creases in consumption patterns of both media and brands and products and services alike.

If I am to look at it anecdotally, here is an example. It was a Sunday evening and auto-rickshaws on the streets of Bangalore were scarce. Every one of the registered 87,000 auto-rickshaws  in the city seemed full. Waiting at the kerb-side, I heard a heated argument taking place between Hindi speaking auto-driver and Kannada speaking passenger. The auto-driver had gathered a big crowd around him. The passenger was shouting at him in Kannada, belting out choice expletives for not running the meter and demanding an excess fare. The auto driver was just harping on one point: “Sir, don’t scold me in Kannada. This is India. Scold me. But scold me in Hindi!” The gathered crowd on up-market Commercial Street was totally with the plea of the auto-driver!

In terms of education, the South is an educated place. In many ways, the very lack of opportunity to work of yore, has by default made the entire region a place that encouraged education. The quality of education doled out by institutions in the South has made it emerge a veritable centre of excellence in higher education. Engineering, medical, management, technical and now even law and catering colleges of repute have positioned far flung towns in South India as magnet towns that attract students from all over the country and overseas as well.

Anecdotally, if you were heli-dropped at Vellore in Tamilnadu, without knowing where you were, you would never know you are in the heart or liver or gizzard of Tamilnadu. The same goes for Manipal in Karnataka, where the population of Manipal is as variegated as the population of India itself. Also, 92 per cent of this town is below the age of 25!

South India, extending that point of a young audience, is an attractive location for the young. The early end-to-end services boom happened in Bangalore and Hyderabad. These cities have emerged hubs for IT companies, Biotech firms and more. A whole eco-system of employment opportunities has emerged in the South. Slapping Bangalore on a resume has become an important adjunct to a techie today. Never mind which part of the world you live in. Bangalore is a value-add.

The South in return has risen to the occasion and put up an excellent infrastructure in place. And many are in a project-stage. Hyderabad and Bangalore  airports(in that order please) are rated among the best in the region. Bangalore has just kicked off its celebrated Metro rail system. Chennai and Hyderabad are already on work in this space. The IT campuses that dot the areas of Bangalore, Mysore, Mangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Coimbatore , Kochi and Trivandrum are exciting locations that resemble something transplanted from the concrete and steel and glass jungles of Manhattan. Mysore boasts of an Infosys Learning Centre that stupefies a visitor in its sheer scale and grandeur of effort.

Add to it as an icing on the cake the super-specialty hospitals of the South, and the South-side story is complete. Well nigh nearly! Well nigh nearly, because the South is still a work-in-progress region, and there is plenty to come.

In sheer terms of per capita income, which is a function of education, employment opportunities and indeed the competition that abounds to get jobs, the South is a special place as well. TN led the per capita income stakes for FY 2010 in the South with INR 62,499.  The per capita income of Kerala stood at INR 59,179. Andhra Pradesh stood at a robust INR 51,025.  and Karnataka followed at INR 50,676. This data needs to be seen in sync with the highs and lows in India, with Goa at the top with 1,32, 719 and Bihar bringing the rear with INR 16,119.

The South is a fully-loaded consumptive location as well. Armed with per capita income that is robust, a media-exposure that is total and stable jobs that bring comfort, the South is a nice place to be if you are a marketer of a two-wheeler or a tank top for that matter. The market is wide open. Wide open to welcome ideas that are traditional and ideas that are modern as well.

The South is an exciting place to be. In sheer population terms this is a region of 251 million stomachs that put in 753 million plus meals in a single day. This is a region that drinks a lot of coffee and tea and beverages of every kind, cold and hot. That’s 251 million bladders to feed every day! Even the market for hair-oil is big. We have 251 million heads. Half of them women. And women with an average length of hair that is all of 9.2 inches. Compare that with the average length of hair on a Chinese woman: 3.1 inches! The market for hair oil and the market for shampoo and 'shikhakai' alike are that much bigger out here. Touche!

The South is a special place. Yes it is! Yes it is!

The author is a brand-domain specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, a private label consulting firm with a presence in the markets of the United Kingdom, Hong Kong and the Indian sub-continent.

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Email: ceo@harishbijoorconsults.com

Twitter.com/harishbijoor