Part 2, ANAND SURANA, CEO of ICEGEIN

In Part 1, we discussed the context in which I met Anand Surana, the CEO of ICEGEIN.   An ICEGEIN video  had come to me through the linkedin.com social media website.  I worked on configuring an RTLS solution for asset management and temperature monitoring.  The ICEGEIN video helped us envision how the future state of our RTLS may look. Of course, this was all guided by our written strategic plan.  In turn, the acquisition plan guided us as to how certain decisions would be made about the life-cycle of the system, including expansion. Part 1 left us with the nursing department’s positive response to the video.   

One year later, 2011, I co-presented at a healthcare information symposium to a standing room only crowd.  A man sat up front.  “Hey,” I thought.  “That looks like Anand Surana.” All I had to go on was a small Linkedin photo.  We had never met or had a video conference.  I decided to be sure.  At the first opportunity, I mentioned the video and how it was an important part of our efforts to show the potential of our plans for RTLS.  A free, no strings attached plug before an audience about something, to that point and to our knowledge, only he alone had done. To say that his smile reflected happiness understates the moment.

    In December 2013, I caught up with Anand again.  He updated me on ICEGEIN. “We have operations dealing with banks, healthcare, and manufacturing,” remarked Anand. “We have expanded outside of RTLS and RFID as well.

    “So, let’s go back a few years.  Just how did you decide to get into the RTLS and RFID markets?”  I asked.

    “After getting a degree from Cardiff University in the United Kingdom, I returned home to Chennai, India to help my parents with their business.”

    “For our audience, can you tell me something about Chennai?”  

Anand replied with all the benevolence one would expect from a person speaking of his home. “Chennai is on the eastern shore located on the Bay of Bengal.  It is the capital city of the state of Tamil Nadu.  The official language is English as it is in all of India.  The local language is Tamil.  About every two hundred kilometers you drive, you will find a different local language. And that is the beauty of our country.

    “Dishes like idli and dosai are very well known.  Idli and Dosai are made from rice and black lentils.”  Idli takes the shape of a waffle while dosai is more like a loaf <how do they differ? 

    “Bharata Natyam is an ancient form of South Indian dance that comes out of Tamil Nadu. The dancers create lines of movement and symbols that capture the lyrics of the song. The dancers transition from one character to the other to parallel the story.

    “Traditional weddings are performed as well. My brother’s wedding lasted three days.  As tradition states, he showed up on a white horse to take his bride home. It was a very traditional wedding.” 

    “Thanks for sharing some of your background.  I appreciate that insight.  After helping your parents with stabilizing and growing their business, then what?”

    “Out of all the capability we had, there was nothing called Corporate IT.  I set out to take on responsibilities that were not really performed by someone as young as I was at the time.  While I was setting up our state-of-the-art IT services, I had in mind setting up a global IT company, too.  RFID was a hot market with huge demands.  It was a good match for the capabilities we had developed.  Currently, we are one of the faster growing companies.”

An important point is that ICEGEIN makes no RTLS or RFID hardware. They build software applications that are independent of the hardware choice.  In the case of RTLS/RFID, especially at this point, the market understands that no single technology fits every business process or every pocketbook.  I believe that integrators and specialized solution providers are positioned to better operate under a hard lesson learned by providers concerning the adoption rate for healthcare.  While one should put enterprise coverage on the table for a prospect, not everything is about tracking everything anywhere in a medical facility.  There are plenty of entry points.  One needs to have options.

The options ICEGEIN and the Surana Group offers are intriguing, even on the basic level.

Coming Up in Part 3 of 3
The Group Backing ICEGEIN
Bold moves in the US Market