SAMIR THAKORBHAI DESAI LOVES TO TELL stories. “Nobody is making money. Look at our customers. Verizon, Cingular, Voicestream, Vodafone...they are all hurting. So are the vendors. Nortel, Alcatel, Motorola...everybody. This brings to mind a famous metaphor from Africa. When the sun rises, there is this gazelle which knows that it must run faster than the fastest lion, or it will turn into breakfast. And under the same rising African sun, there is also this lion which knows that it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or starve for the whole day. I think, in today’s scenario, whether you are a gazelle or a lion, when the sun rises, you’d better be found running, or you’ll simply perish,” booms Desai, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Motorola, Inc.

He further elaborates on his metaphor. “Think and then run.” Desai has 30 years of experience at Motorola in business management and strategy, worldwide supply chain, quality, and ebusiness strategy and implementation. As CIO, Desai is responsible for aligning IT strategy and technology deployment with Motorola’s umbrella business strategy, strengthening Motorola’s IT capabilities crucial to the corporation's growth, and accelerating e-business strategies and capabilities.

In the IT landscape, he sees a severe lack of business acumen, which he believes is fundamental to running a business. “All projects, whether in IT or in conventional business, must be tied to a profit and loss (P&L) statement and balance sheet. It's not that IT professionals lack knowledge of business theories, but, most senior IT managers have no experience of running an entire operation. As a result, many fail to apply common business practices to the IT world. Another common misunderstanding is that when a business case is formulated, the concept of cost avoidance is used to justify the project. Cost avoidance is another trap. IT systems are built to help companies run, but more importantly, it should realize that the system they build should help the company make money. Building systems to avoid certain costs will simply create one more trap.”

Desai should know. As one of the largest manufacturers and retailers of cellular products, Motorola relies on the enterprise infrastructure Desai and his 4,000-member team builds and maintains. “We could have the best product—superior technology, great design—but unless we deliver the value that the user seeks, we will not sell. I think that this absence of customer-need recognition is perhaps the single biggest reason that the IT industry failed.” He insists that “support systems” and the “support” philosophy that an IT team adopts is only a mindset, whereas they should be equally involved in the P&L of the business.

Thirty Years
Desai joined Motorola as an engineer in 1973. He holds a master’s degree in electrical engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago and a master’s degree in business from Loyola University, Chicago. In his rise through the Motorola ranks, Desai has driven divisions under his responsibility to gain sizeable profits and achieve strategic business strengths. During his tenure as senior vice president and general manager of the iDEN Subscriber Group, his team significantly grew the business and formed a strategic partnership with Nextel.

Prior to this, Desai was corporate vice president and general manager of the iDEN Subscriber Division. While at the Network Solutions Sector, Desai led Worldwide Supply Chain, and iDEN Subscriber business, e-business operations that improved manufacturing margins, resulting in several hundred million dollars of cost savings.

Before his current assignment, Desai served as senior vice president and deputy to the president of the Personal Communications Sector (PCS). In that position, he focused on PCS engineering, quality, and program management teams, resulting in the shipment of 12 new platform 2000 cellular phone products in GSM, TDMA, and CDMA.

With a wealth of supply chain management, manufacturing, and product management experience behind him, Desai brings cohesive knowledge of enterprise demands and requirements, matched by the skills needed to meet them. As Motorola’s CIO, he says his role is more as a business-driver than as a support person. “IT cannot be a separate, unaccounted expense. We must be responsible in delivering ROI,” says Desai. “After all, Motorola’s four critical components are design, develop, deliver, and diversify. This hasn’t changed over the last 70-plus years of our history. So why should IT, enterprise software, or support take on any new importance? The business value is more important than the system.”

If you have more query about magazine please send mail to

May 12	April 12	March 12	Feb 12