With appointment of new CEO, IndiaTech.org comes out of stealth mode

After 4 months of being in stealth mode, IndiaTech.org, the lobby group has once again come up with a new CEO on board.

The lobby group has appointed Rameesh Kailasam as the new acting CEO after the resignation of its previous CEO (Gyanendra Badgaiyan, a former IAS officer) due to the controversy of difference in opinion on the high profile lobby group’s future.

The appointment of Kailasam comes at a time of ongoing debate over the draft e-commerce policy and Srikrishna committee report on privacy.

His appointment raise questions on the efficiency of the lobby group as the major part of the e-commerce policy has been suggested in the last 3-4 months when IndiaTech.org was almost out of action.

Like Badgaiyan, Kailasam has also come from a healthy background. He has over two decades of government affairs experience at technology multinationals like IBM and Oracle. He was formerly the acting managing director of public affairs and strategic communications consulting company APCO Worldwide.

APCO is well known for advising PM Modi in various roles.

Led by Sachin Bansal(co-founder and former CEO, Flipkart), Indiatechorg is a non-profit entity, which aims to become the Nasscom for the startup space and help companies to lobby for policy support with the government and other stakeholders.

The group, which also counts Ola, Hike, and Quikr among others made to fight foreign rivals in the country.

It believes that if home-grown internet firms do not succeed, India will likely lose $10 billion of FDI per year, $1 billion of tax revenues per year and 1 million jobs that could have been created based on numbers extrapolated from China.

While India desperately needs such kinds of lobby groups in e-commerce and Internet space, the efficiency of such groups have been challenging. The group must take a cue from debacle of Bengaluru Vision Group.

Formed under the chairmanship of former Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah, the entrepreneurs-studded group (Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy, Wipro chairman Azim Premji, Biocon founder Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, and Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal.) was scrapped down by the state government following the notice from the High Court.

The development was reported by ET.