X|Media|Lab: Parmesh Shahani

Parmesh Shahani is one of India's leading social and interactive media experts.  He answers The Big Idea community questions about how new media can shape and communicate identity.

As Head of Vision & Opportunities, Incubation Laboratory, Parmesh Shahani works on new media, venture capital and innovation for the US $6.7 billion Mahindra & Mahindra and also serves as Editorial Director of Verve magazine.

What is exciting you most right now in the digital arena?

1. The adoption of very specific local content for the web and for cellphones. In India especially, there is a large population of very basic cellphone users. There are people who have simple instruments, and don’t really speak English at all. Despite this there is adoption of value added services, whether in ringtones, whether in religious wallpapers, or otherwise. It's a huge booming market.

2. Likewise, there is good traction for value added services that cater to rural India, or to the bottom of the pyramid. These can be in different ways - for example priced very low, so sachet marketing - even for digital, or use the social entrepreneurship model, but the market exists and companies are excited about going after it.

3. In the online space, blogging has finally taken off in India, a little late, but it’s happening now. Social networking was always happening - its expanding rapidly. Things keep on coming up all the time but there's nothing spectacular that comes to mind. What is unique about India is the size of its market and the opportunity to play creatively. Despite that, I'm actually quite disappointed that companies aren’t being that creative. They prefer to stick to the tried and tested Bollywood and cricket offerings - as this is what brings in the revenue, even in things like internet gaming. I'm seeing some very specific niche based communities - that are exciting, and online-offline models that work, like with the marriage websites, for example, but overall, nothing super-exciting...

What are some of the challenges of ‘commercialising ideas’ in the current economic climate?

The challenge is the same for all companies we fund. Conserving cash, and growing fast but not overreaching. Tapping into opportunities when they arrive and building their brand innovatively. Using synergies whenever possible, to optimize resources.
 
What is your “Big Idea” for 2009?

My big idea is to look at ecosystems. Very often we look at companies specifically, or industries, not at the larger ecosystem they operate in. So to fund a music venture, we might look at the music market in terms of albums being sold etc, not realizing that the contours of this market are changing rapidly because the music ecosystem is evolving. Live performances, the college scene, the arrival of magazines like Rolling Stone and the internet are creating a completely new, fan based ecosystem, and when one positions the music ecosystem within the larger creative ecosystem and sees links between them, then one can also spot funding opportunities.

What potential do you see for new media and the convergence of ideas through globalisation and the consumption of information and entertainment to shape and communicate identity? Are Indians engaging with new media in this way, to create or explore a sense of national or personal identity?

There is tremendous evidence that Indians are fashioning their own sense of both national and personal identity using different new media. There are several examples of this. In the case of national identity, an interesting case is that of the Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty over a year ago, when she was the subject of some alleged racial abuse on Celebrity Big Brother in the UK. There was a united concerted efforts by local Indians as well as the diaspora in increasing the level of noise about this on the internet - and the volume became so loud that the British government had to get involved in what was essentially, a tabloid story.

The narrative over the past few years has been of India Shining - an India whose time has come - and whether it is large media houses and their websites, or personal bloggers, this has been a key feature in the way the Indian internet community - which is largely English speaking, upper middle class, and educated  - has chosen to fashion itself. This plays out in politics, in sports, in fashion, Bollywood, etc. There are smaller voices - which perhaps paint a different story, of a very different India, but this hasn't caught on in the public imagination.

At the same time, new media are enabling smaller subsets to create and experiment with their personal identities. My book on the urban gay community in contemporary India for example, deals with one such online - offline network, called Gay Bombay. Members, which include both out and closeted urban men, are using the anonymity of email addresses, and the geographical disconnection of mobile phone numbers to place, to explore who they are in terms of their sexuality, and how they can express this within the context of their communal or national identities.

Considering 97% of young India (12-35) does not have internet access, what is the relevance of new media there now & in the near future?

Internet usage in India is very low - about 50 million users based on the last survey, as opposed to over 300 million cellphone users. These are already seriously respectable numbers. I think new media is extremely relevant in India, although its texture and how it is being used and modified is particularly local. It is enabling an entire generation of young India to leapfrog over infrastructural bottlenecks into a more self directed future. This could be in several areas - whether in education, whether in enabling entrepreneurship, whether in an increased self confidence due to personalized, and portable entertainment. I think it is especially important for rural India, which has embraced the cellphone hungrily and there are so many wonderful case studies that are emerging from there that deal with how innovative India can be, if empowered.

Parmesh Shahani bio

Head, Vision & Opportunities, Incubation Laboratory, Mahindra & Mahindra (Mumbai)

Parmesh is also affiliated with Boston based think tank - the MIT Convergence Culture Consortium, exploring the ways in which the business landscape is changing in response to the growing integration of content and brands across media platforms and the increasingly prominent role that consumer are playing in the shaping the flow of media.

His prior work experiences have included founding India's first youth website, business development for Sony's Indian television channel operations, writing and editing copy for Elle magazine and the Times of India group, helping make a low-budget feature film and teaching as a visiting faculty member at a Bombay college. Parmesh holds undergraduate degrees in commerce and education from the University of Bombay, and a graduate degree in Comparative Media Studies, from MIT. His first book - Gay Bombay: Globalization, Love and (Be)Longing in Contemporary India (New Delhi, London, Los Angeles, Singapore: Sage Publications) was released in April 2008.