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Executive Interviews: Interview with Miguel Angel Gardetti on Bottom of the Pyramid
November 2008
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By Dr. Nagendra V Chowdary
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What are the risks and challenges
of serving the BOP markets,
especially for the MNCs? What
precautions, if any, should be taken?
Many aspects of this question were
answered in previous questions.
However, it should be noted that the
BoP poses a challenge to both
companies and their executives, as it
creates an acute tension between
continuity and discontinuity. The
former, illustrated by concepts such
as efficiency, operations, control,
resource allocation, and convergent
thinking, the latter, by imagination,
innovation, creative destruction,
resource attraction, divergent
thinking.
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Is there any dichotomy between
Social Entrepreneurship/ Microfinance
initiatives and BOP
philosophy? While the former's
objective is to increase their
purchasing power by organizing
businesses around their
communities, BOP seems to take
away that purchasing power?
Grameen Bank's micro-credit model
together with the rural poor in
Bangladesh, evidences the logical
core and practices of the "New
Commons" school of thought. What seems to be necessary is a
business strategy based on a deep and
personal approach to the community
in terms of business design and
development. Such approach for a
"joint undertaking" would combine
the capabilities and knowledge of
corporations with those of
communities, thus setting the
business within the framework of the
existing social and cultural
institutions. It is clear that this
"integrated innovation strategy"
would require a different set of
capabilities called "native capability."
And this has given rise to the Base of
the Pyramid Protocol: it reflects an
innovation process which brings a
corporation and a BOP community
together in an alliance to imagine,
launch, and develop a new business
that would serve that particular
community. Just as in the New
Commons school of thought, the goal
is notmerely to create a new business
model which combines the resources
of both parties. On the contrary, the
opportunity lies in jointly creating a
new community environment where
the company becomes part of the
community identity.
1.
Bottom of the Pyramid Case Study
2. ICMR
Case Collection
3.
Case Study Volumes
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The Interview was conducted by Dr. Nagendra V Chowdary, Consulting Editor, Effective
Executive and Dean, IBSCDC, Hyderabad. This Interview was originally published in Effective Executive, IUP, November 2008. Copyright © November 2008, IBSCDC
No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced or distributed, stored in a retrieval
system, used in a spreadsheet, or transmitted in any form or medium electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the permission of IBSCDC. |
