Soumitra Dutta
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Early life
[ From the archives of the Times of India]
Born in Chandigarh to an Indian Air Force doctor, Soumitra’s first idea of home, the one address you go back to everyday for years, came at the age of 26 when he moved to Fountainbleu, an hour and a half from Paris, as an assistant professor at INSEAD. After the 22-yearstint there, he has neither the famous European indifference, nor a Western accent. “I strongly hold on to two things that I brought with me from India: respecting diversity and the importance of family values,” he says. An alumnus of IIT-Delhi from the class of 1985, he completed his BTech in electrical engineering & computer science with a proud second rank. Soumitra’s first school was a tiny one in Jorhat, Assam, and the nature of his father’s job took him to various places. What did not change was his academic record. “He never moved from the first rank,” his mother Tara Dutta told this paper. In fact, his dad realised pretty early that Soumitra was a bright child and stopped teaching him. “He would ask very tough questions I had no answers for,” says retired Air Marshal R K Dutta.
Young Soumitra was no bookworm though, his other passions including bodybuilding and table-tennis. After passing out of IIT-Delhi, he completed his MS in Computer Science, MS in Business Administration and PhD in Computer Science from the University of California-Berkeley. Dutta, who has published 20 books and monographs, is credited with publishing the Global Information Technology Report (co-published with the World Economic Forum) and the Global Innovation Index (co-published with the World Intellectual Property Organization). He is also seen as an authority on emerging markets having done intense research around the Latin American, Chinese and Indian markets.
2012
[ From the archives of the Times of India]
Hemali Chhapia & Samidha Sharma TNN
IIT-D grad to head Cornell’s B-school
Nitin Nohria (Harvard BSchool), Dipak Jain (Kellogg, INSEAD)... The world’s top B-schools increasingly seem to prefer Indianorigin heads. Now, add another name — Soumitra Dutta, new dean of Cornell University’s management school. The IIT-Delhi alumnus will be the first Indian-origin dean at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management when he takes over on July 1.
A professor of business and technology and founder and faculty director of a new-media and technology innovation lab at INSEAD’s French campus, Soumitra Dutta was one of two finalists at the end of a long search process that began in August last year. He will be the first dean at a top American business school from outside the US. “Professor Dutta's appointment is a natural fit with Johnson’s increasingly global outlook,” said David Skorton, president of Cornell University.
As part of Dutta’s offer, Cornell will hire his wife, Spaniard Lourdes Casanova, as a senior lecturer of management in the Johnson school. The couple have a daughter, who studies at Oxford University. A call to the man of the hour can be a tricky business; the queue to get to him is long; but significantly, it has dawned on him that he’s high denomination. Dutta, though, surprises us when he picks up the cellphone during lunch hour, and says: “Of course we can talk. I have more time for you than what you are asking for.” Quickly then, very typical of a new media man, who has linked technology to management, he adds, “Hold on. Let me put on my hand’s free.” Nils Fonstad, an assistant director at INSEAD’s E-lab, fondly describes Dutta and Lourdes as the most welcoming couple in Fountainbleu. “They celebrated Diwali and then brought in the New Year in a very traditional French way by celebrating La Galette de Rois. They invited the whole community to their home. They are extremely generous.” Another IIT-Delhi almunus Prof Harbir Singh, Vice Dean, Global Initiatives, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, said, “This appointment is a reflection of the great interest that business schools have in leaders who have had diverse international experience.”
BIG LEAP
Named dean of Ivy league Cornell University’s business school, begins his five-year term on July 1 Will be first Indian to head Samuel Curtis Johnsoon Graduate School of Management Currently professor of business and technology at INSEAD’s French campus where he has been for 20 yrs. Founder and faculty director of a new media and technology innovation lab at INSEAD. As part of his offer, Cornell agreed to hire his spouse Lourdes Casanova as a senior lecturer of management with the Johnson faculty. The couple have a daughter, Sara, who studies at Oxford University. An IIT-Delhi alumnus (BE in electrical engg & computer science), Dutta did his master’s and PhD from University of California-Berkeley. Has been an engineer with General Electric (NY) and Schlumberger (Japan)
