R. Sriram
Entrepreneur, Mentor, Consultant, Entrepreneur
Sriram’s passion for books was serendipitous and led him to establish various
bookstores – he started with Landmark in Chennai, set up Walden in Hyderabad and
then the Crossword chain. He co-founded Crossword with Ms. K. Anita in 1992 and
helped build it into India’s leading bookstore chain. He arranged for the buyout of
Crossword by the current owners Shoppers’ Stop Ltd. in 2000 from the initial investors
India Book House Ltd.
He stepped down from Crossword in August 2006 and co-founded “Next Practice
Retail”, which offers business design, incubation and consulting services for consumer
and retail businesses. He serves as an Independent Director on the Boards of Camlin
Limited and Camlin Alphakids Limited.
Sriram is President of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) Mumbai, the global not-for-profit
organization that fosters entrepreneurship. He serves on the advisory boards of
Pratham Books, the non-profit trust that seeks to publish high-quality books for children
at an affordable cost in multiple Indian languages, and SNEHA - the non-profit Society
for Nutrition, Education & Health Action for women and children in urban slums.
Sriram advises and mentors individuals and firms, and is particularly interested in
entrepreneurship, customer based innovation, business strategy & incubation, social
entrepreneurship and next practices.
While at Crossword, Sriram established the Crossword Book Awards, now known as
the Vodafone Crossword Book Awards, to annually recognise and reward the best
Indian writers and books, which he continues to oversee. He has curated the Kala
Ghoda Literature Festival from 2005 to 2010.
Sriram has been a visiting faculty at IIM A and a guest lecturer at IIM L and other
business schools as it helps him keep learning.
He remains a student and a book evangelist.