IIMB’s Centre for Software & IT Management co-hosts 6th India Software Product Management Summit with International Software Product Management Association 

Bengaluru, February 20, 2024: IIM Bangalore’s Centre for Software and Information Technology Management (CSITM) co-hosted the sixth edition of the India Software Product Management Summit, along with the International Software Product Management Association (ISPMA)This year, the theme for the SPM summit was ‘Product AI: Navigating the Future of Product Management’.

The India Software Product Management Summit 2024 featured keynote speeches, presentations by industry experts, panel discussions, interactive workshops, academic paper presentations, and more. This year’s summit also featured a student case competition that underscores the active involvement of students from Product and Business disciplines nationwide, fostering a diverse and vibrant community of future leaders in the field.

ISPMA University Chapter at IIM Bangalore was unveiled by Prof. Rishikesha T Krishnan, Director, IIM Bangalore; Summit Chair Prof. S. Sadagopan, Chairman, ISPMA India Chapter; Hans-Bernd Kittlaus, Chairman of the Board, ISPMA; Program Chair (Academic Track) Prof. Spurthy Dharanikota, faculty from the Information Systems area of IIM Bangalore and ISPMA Fellow; Prof. Shankhadeep Banerjee, Chairperson of the Centre for Software & Information Technology Management as well as IT Facilitation Committee and faculty of the Information Systems area of IIMB, and Prof. Haragopal Mangipudi, Global Board Member, ISPMA.

The summit was inaugurated by Prof. S. Sadagopan; Dr. Pramod Varma, Former Chief Architect of Aadhaar; Hans-Bernd Kittlaus; Prof. Shankhadeep Banerjee; Prof. Spurthy Dharanikota, and Abhijit Bendigiri, Program Chair, Industry Track, and Director - Product Management, Oracle Health and AI.

Dr. Spurthy Dharanikota and Abhijit Bendigiri provided an overview of the summit, while Prof. Shankhadeep Banerjee and Prof. S. Sadagopan delivered the welcome address. Dr. Pramod Varma delivered the keynote address on, 'Building Products and AI for Societal Transformation'. Hans-Bernd Kittlaus delivered an address on, 'Product Manager vs Product Owner – Why Do Companies Still Struggle 23 Years After the Agile Manifesto?'.

The summit included Academic/Research and Industry tracks. Student case competitions, panel discussions and presentations by the students of UC Berkeley, IIM Sambalpur and IIM Bangalore were held as part of the Academic Track, apart from the academic/research paper presentations. The Industry Track consisted of the keynote address, presentations, panel discussions and fireside chats with industry leaders.

Student Case Competition: The jury of the Student Case Competition comprised Prof. Haragopal Mangipudi, Prof. Spurthy Dharanikota, Muthu Ranganathan, Ankita Parihar, Anjan Goswami and Deepak Padmanabha. The winning teams were Dexters - BITS School of Management (BITSoM), Mumbai, India (second runner-up); Vision Crafters - IIM Bangalore (runner-up), and Alpha - Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies (SSCBS), University of Delhi (DU), Delhi (winner).

Panel discussions: Haragopal Mangipudi moderated a panel discussion on, ‘Product Innovation and the Emerging Role of AI’, featuring Viraj Tyagi, CEO, eGov Foundation; Rishi Nayar, SVP & Country Head, Ellucian; Suresh Rajagopalan, CEO, Wibmo, a PayU Company, and Somshubro Pal Choudhury, Partner, Bharat Innovation Fund.
Prof. S. Sadagopan moderated the panel discussion on, 'Emergence and Sustainability of Non-AI Solutions in AI World', with panelists Srivatsan Santhanam, VP, Spend Management, SAP; SatyaKrishna Pillarishetty, Principal PM, Oracle Health and AI, and Anand Srivastava, Head Products, Genesys.

SPM Excellence Awards: The global jury of the SPM Excellence Awards comprised Peter Stadlinger, Senior Director of Products, Freshworks, USA, Jury Chair, Hans-Bernd Kittlaus, Venkatesh Balakrishnan, Manager, CSITM, IIMB, and Andrey Saltan, Researcher, LUT University, Finland. The winners were Utpan from Vridhi Cap (Start-up category); UPI Transaction Manager from Infosys Edgeverve Finacle (New Software Product from Established Company category); Vin eRetail from Vinculum (Established Software Product category), and ZEE5 from Zee Entertainment (Platforms category).

Best Academic Paper Awards: Dr. Spurthy Dharanikota, announced the awards for the Academic Track. The Best Research Paper winners were Manisha Rathi for a paper titled, ‘Leveraging AI Public Goods for Social Welfare through Ecosystem Approach’ (second runner-up); Ramalingeswara Rao K V for the paper titled, ‘System and Method for Automatic Naming Convention of Audio Files Based on User Preferences’ (first runner-up), and Sanyam Jangir, Deepan Gk and Ravi Dave for a paper titled, ‘A Bottom-up Approach for Analyzing Fluctuations in Financial Statements’ (winners).

Pre-conference workshops: Three pre-conference workshops were also conducted on 15th February 2024, which saw more than 350 participants. The interactive and informative workshops were conducted by Prof. Haragopal Mangipudi, Vidhi Chugh, Hans-Bernd Kittlaus, Abhijit Bendigiri, Bhaskaran Srinivasan and Ashish Gupta.

SPM Summit India is an annual event that brings together product management professionals, academicians, thought leaders and experts from all around the world. This informative and engaging event aims to share knowledge, insights and best practices in the field of software product management. At SPM Summit India, attendees get the opportunity to learn from industry experts, network with peers and explore the latest trends and innovations in product management. The event features keynote speeches, interactive workshops, panel discussions, fireside chats, academic papers, presentations on industry best practices and success stories covering a wide range of topics under software product management. The CSITM of IIM Bangalore has been hosting the annual event in India in collaboration with ISPMA since 2019.