The Covid-19 crisis will force entrepreneurs to “adapt and create”: Ratan Tata

Tata Group Chairman Emeritus Ratan Tata on Monday said that the Covid-19 pandemic will force entrepreneurs to innovate and adapt to changes.

“This crisis will force entrepreneurs to adapt and create,” Tata wrote in an Instagram post.

Tata who had been awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Manchester for his contribution to innovation and philanthropy back in February detailed the impact of the crisis on businesses in his post. He wrote about how the current crisis will drive businesses to find creative ways in order to survive.

“In past difficult times, entrepreneurs have displayed farsightedness and creativity that could not have been believed to exist. These became the flagpoles of innovation and new technology today,” he wrote.

“I hope that the ability to find another way to build a product, run a company, run operations a better way, will emerge as an outcome of the current crisis,” he further wrote.

Tata said that the businesses that tackle the challenges of today are bound to set the benchmark for businesses coming up in the future.

“I won’t downplay the challenges and the difficulties embedded in these current times. But my confidence remains high in the inventive nature and the creativity of entrepreneurs today who will find ways to enable new or modified enterprises that would be the benchmarks of tomorrow. It can all start on a clean sheet of paper that looks at ways of doing things that were never thought of before,” he said.

The former Tata Group chief had recently made a personal token investment in a start-up headed by 18-year-old Arjun Deshpande. The start-up, founded two years ago, is a pharmaceutical venture called Generic Aadhaar which aims to make medicines affordable to people.

It sources affordable, quality generic drugs from four contract manufacturers, and supplies them (without additional distribution and retail costs) to a network of about 30 retail chemists across Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore and Odisha.

The Tata Trust chairman has also invested in over a dozen start-ups including Ola, Paytm, Snapdeal, CureFit, Urban Ladder and Avanti Finance.

The Tata Trust had earlier ₹500 crore to combat the Covid-19 pandemic in the country which will be used to purchase personal protective equipment for the medical personnel, respiratory systems for treating increasing cases, purchase of testing kits, setting up modular treatment facilities for infected patients and for knowledge management and training of health workers and the general public.