The IT Committee of The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry organized IT @ Bengal Conclave 2014: Innovations and Opportunities on 31st July and 1st August at The Park, Kolkata. The Conclave featured two forums – Innovator’s Forum on 31st July and Stakeholder’s Forum on 1st August.

Dr. Emmanuelle Savarit, User Research & Digital Strategy Director, Analyse-Concept Ltd, UK was the Keynote Speaker and she addressed on “Quantitative and Qualitative research approaches and benefits in the global world of IT: From Analytics to User experience (UX).” The Innovator’s Forum also included a Panel Discussion on “Indian IT: Can we stay Competitive?”. The Panelists were Mr. Rajarshi Chatterjee, Vice President and Head of Global Delivery Solutions, Atos India; Mr. Sudipta K. Sen, Regional Director, South East Asia, Vice Chairman & Board Member – India, SAS India; Mr. Sanjeev Varma, CEO, Steria India Ltd; Mr. Bhudeb Chakravarti, Associate Vice President, National Institute for Smart Government. Mr. Ambarish Dasgupta, Vice President, BCC&I and Partner and Head Management Consulting and Eastern Regional Leader, KPMG Advisory Services Pvt. Ltd. delivered the Welcome Address and set the agenda of the evening.

The Stakeholder’s Forum commenced with Setting the Agenda by Mr. Kaushik Bhattacharya, Location Head - Kolkata and SAP Practice Area Lead - IBM Account, IBM India. The Stakeholder’s Forum featured four Discussion Forums on “IT @ Bengal – A Strategic Vision”; “Emerging Technologies”; “Journey from 2.6 – 15 – Industry Talk on The Way Ahead for IT @ Bengal” and “Capitalizing the Potency”.

Mr. Hirak N Sengupta, Chairman, Webel was the Guest of Honour. The Discussion Forum on “IT @ Bengal – A Strategic Vision” included Col. A K Nath, Executive Director, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing and Mr. Nirmal K Ray, General Manager, Webel. In the Discussion Forum on “Emerging Technologies”, Mr. Dinesh Parekh, Senior Director – Sales, Consulting Leader, Oracle India shared an overall perspective of emerging technologies. The vertical specific perspectives were shared by Mr. Dipankar Khasnabish, Industry Principal - Government, Healthcare and Infrastructure, Infosys Ltd. who spoke on Healthcare; Mr. Sumit D. Chowdhury, President, Reliance Jio on Telecommunication and Ms. Kasturi Bhattacharjee, Director-Industry and Society Head, Ericsson India Global Services Pvt. Ltd. on Networked Society. Mr. Rajiv Pratap, Co-Founder, Abzooba Inc and Mr. Rajarshi Sengupta, Senior Director, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India Pvt. Ltd. addressed the Discussion Forum on “Journey from 2.6 – 15 – Industry Talk on the way ahead for IT @ Bengal”. Mr. Pratap highlighted the way forward for Bengal in the domain on “Analytics” and Mr. Sengupta shared the perspective of the consultant. The Concluding Forum on “Capitalizing the Potency” featured HR in IT. The Forum included Mr. Suresh Bethavandu, AVP HR, Cognizant Technology Solutions India Limited who shared the Industry Perspective and Mr. Charanpreet Singh, Chief Executive Officer of AIM Education and the Associate Dean of Praxis Business School who shared the Academia Perspective.