Driving the AI-First Enterprise: Insights from Narayanan Raman, Partner, Deloitte India
Some edited excerpts from the interview:
India has a unique mix of traditional industries and digital-first startups. where do you see the biggest opportunities for AI-led transformation?
Easy accessibility of AI tools, solutions, and services at a reasonable cost will unlock significant value for both traditional enterprises and digital-first startups. Many startups, having been born in the cloud, already enjoy an inherent advantage in understanding and implementing AI-led solutions. At the same time, the sheer scale, size, and reach of India’s traditional industries—combined with the vast possibilities AI can uncover in specific contexts—present immense potential for these sectors to harness AI effectively.
What role can AI play in helping Indian organizations leapfrog stages of digital maturity compared to global peers?
Two factors are at play here. One, Indian organizations that have not yet embarked on significant digital transformations can architect digital journeys leveraging an AI first approach from the get-go versus AI enabling existing digital journeys. Two, accessibility and a low barrier to entry are enabling faster AI led MVPs, quicker scaled-solution implementation, and faster adoption. Indian organizations also have access to scaled AI talent at a relatively lower cost base than global peers, which is an added advantage.
For enterprises looking beyond experimentation, what should be the key pillars of a scalable AI strategy?
Here are my top three of the few important considerations:
1. Choose the right use case to begin with – Start small, solve problems for which you can see results, develop a business case based on the observed results, and build confidence and knowledge in the process before you start scaling
2. Develop clarity on what to buy off the shelf versus what to build. Generally, while off the shelf AI / Gen-AI solutions are very effective at performing generalized tasks, custom solutions, especially the ones involving integration with an organization’s business process (e.g., agentic AI solutions) will require a varying extent of custom development
3. Design and pressure test your solution such that it effectively addresses security, trust, cost and performance specific requirements and considerations
What excites you most about AI’s potential in India over the next 3–5 years?
The possibilities are immense. The strategic push that the Government has made through the INDIAAI mission to strengthen the India AI ecosystem across multiple areas – establishment of public AI compute infrastructure, investment in development of indigenous foundational models and safe and trusted AI tools, and nurturing AI startup ecosystem – is impressive, and this will pave the way for holistic development of the AI ecosystem in India over the next few years. While we see immense potential of AI across business sectors, I am most excited about the possibilities, value creation and societal benefit that AI will unlock in heathcare, life sciences, education, agriculture, and financial inclusion areas.
If you had to give one piece of advice to Indian CXOs starting their AI journey today, what would it be?
Be realistic and balance ambition with realism across various decisions that will need to be taken along the AI journey for an organization. For example, we may have an ambition of very high levels of accuracy from AI but may be far more forgiving about manual errors. How to leverage the best of what AI has to offer through appropriate controls and keeping human in the loop is a reasonable way to keep advancing in this journey.