Five Indian companies including Larsen & Toubro, Hindustan Unilever and Infosys rank among Forbes magazine's list of "The World's Most Innovative Companies" topped by four US companies. Larsen & Toubro with an annual sales growth of 19 per cent ranks ninth in the world followed by Hindustan Unilever (12) with 11.4 per cent. Infosys (19) comes third with 12.7 per cent growth as per the US business magazine which factors a parameter called lower "innovation premium," measuring the difference between the value of the company's existing businesses and its expected future innovations. Companies must also have $10 billion in market capitalisation with a R&D spend at least 1 per cent of their asset base. Tata Consultancy Services (29) with 19.5 per cent ranked fourth among Indian companies while Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (38) with a 14.6 growth brought up the rear. Four US companies- cloud computing firm Salesforce.com, drug major Alexion Pharmaceuticals, internet retail giant Amazon.com and open source software leader Red Hat were placed at the top slots. Forbes said its analyses showed at least three key things that the innovative companies did to create and sustain an innovation premium - how well companies leveraged people, processes, and philosophies, differentiated the best in class from the next in class when it came to keeping innovation alive along with delivering an innovation premium year after year. Forbes also featured SD Shibulal, cofounder and CEO of Infosys (#19 this year; #15 last), calling him "both observer and experimenter." He says in his 30 years with the company there was nothing he had not done. He was the first sales person, had done account management, launched its internet consulting practice, is a network expert, and has helped design and launch its first ecommerce application. He had been the head of both delivery and sales, the magazine noted. Shibulal also took a five year sabbatical to work for another firm, Sun Microsystems to get a new perspective according to Forbes. He is also known to be an experimenter and "gadget freak" and also revered as a "gizmo guru." According to Forbes, it found that successful leaders personally understood how innovation happened and they tried to imprint their behaviours as processes and philosophies within their organisation. Meanwhile, Infosys, the company that had emerged as an icon of India's outsourcing powerhouse but has has to struggle this year and would have to wait longer than expected for returns from a remodelled strategy. The Bangalore-based company worth $7 billion has missed sales targets, lost market share, deferred an annual pay rise and seen its stock take a beating this year. The realisation of the benefits would be delayed short-term, according to SD Shibulal, the company's chief executive officer, in a reference to "Infosys 3.0" strategy that the company said would better position it for the future. It comes as a rare aberration for a company known for consistently hitting or beating its targets. Under the strategy, Infosys would focus largely on higher-value software and consulting that could be applied across clients rather than on labour-intensive plain vanilla outsourcing services. What makes matters worse for Infosys is this comes at a time when its corporate clients in the US and Europe, including its core financial services base, are struggling, cutting back spends, engaging with fewer vendors and putting off decisions. Source: Domain-B
