Tech Mahindra's Ecosystem: Driving Outcome-Driven AI Transformations

Mayank explains that Tech Mahindra’s services go beyond traditional IT and Operations Technology (OT) to create a converged environment that includes the network. He emphasizes that this three-pronged approach is crucial for achieving seamless digital transformation. Tech Mahindra works across various verticals as a system integrator, with a strong focus on telecom, banking and financial services, and manufacturing. The company aims to be a trusted, consultative partner in the manufacturing sector, providing an end-to-end journey from creating a future roadmap to real-world execution. The ultimate goal is to evolve the customer’s landscape while keeping the end customer at the center of every decision.

This comprehensive strategy is exemplified by Tech Mahindra’s work with a global chemical manufacturer, BASF, where they are transforming the company's enterprise network across 600 sites in 72 countries. They implemented a "network as a service" model to achieve this massive project without disrupting business. This model allows the customer to pay for the service they consume rather than making a substantial upfront capital investment, a significant industry trend. By utilizing an ecosystem of partners, Tech Mahindra successfully re-engineered processes, managed people, and brought new technologies to transform the client's infrastructure. This focus on outcome-driven solutions ensures that the customer realizes tangible business benefits.

The concept of a converged environment extends to the telecom space, where Tech Mahindra is helping a premier Dutch telco, KPN, to achieve autonomous operations. By bringing in process changes and innovative technology, the objective is to take the telco from a level three to a level five of autonomy. This doesn’t lead to job losses; instead, it frees employees to be utilized more effectively. This is a clear example of how Tech Mahindra's digital transformation efforts are designed to create a single pane of glass for visibility, helping telcos manage their IT, OT, and network systems in a unified way and reduce their mean time to repair (MTTR).

A significant trend in the technology and services industry is the shift towards flexible financial models, such as pay-as-you-go. This approach is driven by customers' desire to avoid tying up capital expenditure and to access specialized expertise that is constantly evolving. Tech Mahindra leverages its ecosystem of partners, including technology vendors and financing arms, to deliver these models. The financing arm often plays a critical role by taking ownership of the physical assets, like hardware, and managing their lifecycle, including refresh cycles and repurposing. This allows Tech Mahindra to focus on its core strength: delivering an outcome. It’s a win-win for everyone involved, as the customer gets the desired business outcome without the burden of heavy capital investment.

The recycling and repurposing of used assets, which used to end up in junkyards, is now a more structured process, driven by both financing and sustainability. This trend has accelerated in recent years, with much funding available to support it. For example, technology partners like Lenovo, HPE, and Dell are now seeing their equipment repurposed for data centers, as long as it meets quality standards. The rise of cloud computing and data residency regulations has also widened the scope for these arrangements. This evolution in the financial model of IT services is an integral part of the broader digital transformation that Tech Mahindra facilitates.

The discussion also explores how this convergence of technology and financial models impacts the banking and finance sector. Banks, the backbone of any economy, have been at the forefront of transformation and are not shy about investing. However, their capital is limited. Tech Mahindra helps them modernize legacy systems, such as mainframes, to free up cash. This freed-up cash can be reinvested in further transformation, such as implementing robotic process automation or enhancing anti-money laundering systems. By offering platforms like Temenos on a cloud-based, consumption-based model, Tech Mahindra enables banks to achieve their transformation goals without a massive upfront expenditure, reinforcing the importance of outcome-driven solutions in the finance sector.

Tech Mahindra prides itself on a culture of "drinking our own champagne" to deliver on these complex projects. This means they implement technologies and solutions internally before offering them to customers. For example, they transformed their internal service management system with ServiceNow and implemented SAP S/4HANA before bringing these solutions to their clients. This internal experimentation provides a crucial learning ground and builds confidence in their solutions. The company operates with a philosophy of "fail fast, recover faster" and uses lab setups to test new ideas. This approach to internal AI transformation ensures their readiness to help others.

Mayank describes his role in Europe as running the partner ecosystem and details how his team orchestrates a complex network of alliances. A key mantra is transparency, with a clear understanding that they either "sail together or fail together" with their partners. Before an RFP is even released, Tech Mahindra collaborates with its partners to strategize a win, as they know that without a pre-formed alliance, they have a 50% lower chance of success. They also engage in "co-opetition," working alongside other system integrators on complex projects where each partner serves a different part of the solution. This model is gaining traction because it provides a flexible approach to delivering complex projects as long as the roles and responsibilities are clearly defined.

At the heart of Tech Mahindra's success is its people-first approach. Recognizing that talent is a valuable and scarce resource, they prioritize a diverse workforce and focus on grooming internal talent. The company invests in making its people "future-ready" by providing certifications in new technologies. Mayank notes that they are not afraid of AI, but rather embrace it. They have a company-wide initiative to train the entire organization in AI transformation, from sales to delivery, and they have used AI to create a foundational large language model, therapeutic molecules, and apps for farmers, among other things. The goal is not to eliminate jobs, but to free up people to be utilized more effectively. Mayank Shekhar Choudhary's interview with Sugata Sanyal provides valuable insights into how Tech Mahindra builds partnerships, drives digital and AI transformations, and maintains a people-first culture.