Failure is part of the innovation process: Karnik

If organisations want to encourage innovation they must be prepared to accept failure; in 10 ventures, only two may be wildly successful, but to get to those two, you have to do all ten, said Kiran Karnik, former President, Nasscom, chief guest at the 6th edition of the CavinKare-MMA Chinnikrishnan Innovation Awards 2017, held on Wednesday. “Failure is part of the overall innovation process; you learn a lot from it and get better the next time around,” said Karnik in his keynote address.

Karnik said, unfortunately, in India the venture capitalists tend to reject funding for those who have failed in a venture, though these attitudes are slowly changing. “Failure here is rejected but it’s ideas that fail and people don’t fail.

Social attitudes need to change. If something fails, someone gains experience. It is critical to recognise that failure is the building path to success,” he elaborated.

The Chinnikrishnan Innovation Awards honours small innovative entrepreneurs and identifies growing small-scale enterprises and their ability to be scalable. Established in 2011, the award commemorates the memory of the late R Chinnikrishnan, who pioneered the sachet revolution in shampoos.

The awards went to S Kavita, G Venkatasubramaniyan and P Ponram.

Kavita is the CEO of FIB SOL Life Technologies Pvt Ltd. Her firm developed a low weight biodegradable and stable bio-fertiliser carrying membrane which are loaded with soil nutrient fixing microbes in 25 gm of tissue paper that dissolves easily in water and can fertilise an acre of land.

Venkatasubramaniyan is a partner of CMR Bitplast. His firm helps build better roads with the use of plastic waste with a new ‘wet process technology’ which is more cost-effective.

Ponram is a Director at Tejas Translational Tech Pvt Ltd. His firm came up with a bio-medical device which locate veins in patients within seconds making it easy to insert needles for blood sample collection and injecting medicines. CK Ranganathan, Chairman, CavinKare Pvt Ltd, said Tamil Nadu has transformed itself into a hub of innovation with many start-ups emerging not just from Chennai but also from several Tier-2 and -3 cities.

“The objective of these awards is to recognise such exemplary start-ups from these emerging cities and nurture their spirit of innovation,” he said.