Profit Power Economics: CSITM lecture by Dr. Mia de Kuijper

Business strategy is one of the hottest areas of study and research in B-schools. Getting to hear leading thinkers in this area is one of the added privileges of studying at IIMB.

CSITM organized a talk by Dr. Mia de Kuijper, a Harvard trained economist, few days ago. Apart from having held senior positions in global giants like Pepsico, Shell and AT&T, Dr. Mia is also the author a recent book researching successful business strategies - "Profit Power Economics: A New Competitive Strategy for Creating Sustainable Wealth".

In her talk Dr. Mia went into great depths to explain the idea behind transparency and power nodes. She insightfully portrayed how access to information is shattering the economic theories around information asymmetry.. this beautiful Banglalink advertisement clearly brought out this reality. The 21st century business model needs new organization forms, she stressed. The vertically integrated companies of the world are under serious attack - AT&T can no longer debate if it has to 'manufacture' the phones it sells - it simply can't!

I would remember this lecture for the many vivid illustrations that Dr. Mia presented. In a short animation, she showed us the growth of Wal-Mart super-center's across US geography which left the audience in a wide gasp. She brought to life the 'idea' behind the birth of Pepsi's bottled water 'Aquafina' - a massive challenge even for this soft-drink giant - to produce uniform taste and quality water across the globe. And I dont think many would know how capital intensive pepsico's snack-chips business is..

For students of business like in PGSEM, where the focus is on case-based learning, its always a great opportunity to listen to real life practitioners. Many of the concepts and problems in those business cases come to life. And our worldview of business continuously expands.

Finally, a 'Thank you' to Dr. Mia and CSITM for this wonderful lecture.