Workshops

ICT for Business Clusters in Emerging Markets

A pdf publication with papers from this workshop is now available

You can contact the organizers for a full copy, or download the papers from here. The following files are available:

The original workshop schedule remains posted below.

Organizers

Soumya Roy
soumyaroy AT motorola.com
Motorola India Research Labs
Bangalore, India

Shantanu Biswas
shantanu AT motorola.com
Motorola India Research Labs
Bangalore, India

Kurt DeMaagd kdemaagd AT msu.edu
Telecommunications, Information Studies, and Media
Michigan State University
East Lansing, Michigan

Workshop Theme

Clustering of economic activities is practiced in developing nations to promote the growth of small firms. Recently, public-private efforts have engaged in several cluster- growth initiatives. To date, not much attention has been focused on understanding whether ICT can be an enabler in the cluster development and, if yes, how. The main inhibitor towards that kind of study is the lack of existing knowledge of business clusters in developing nations. In current literature, there is limited information regarding the history, business processes, collaborative efforts, barriers and future trends of clusters in developing nations.

Nonetheless, now is an opportune moment to take a hard look at this subject. Clusters in developing regions are both seeing new opportunities and facing new hurdles in the face of economic liberalization and opening of the markets. Through this workshop, we will bring together practitioners and academics to discuss on-the-ground experiences working with clusters in developing nations, to present the evolving theories of ICT adoption, and to set up goals for future research.

The workshop will enable both current researchers and practitioners to actively collaborate and exchange ideas. The final objective will be to understand:

Activities

We expect participation in the form of paper presentations and group discussions. We will solicit papers related to, but not limited to, the following topics:

Following the paper presentations, we will hold small-group discussion sessions. The topics for these discussions will be based on the morning presentations and other submissions to the workshop. Following the small-group meetings, the group will come back together and for a group discussion. In this large group discussion, the objective would be to set directions and an agenda for the implementation of ideas and future research.

The Final Workshop Schedule

9:15 AM -
9:30 AM		 Opening
Remarks		 Souyma Roy, Shantanu Biswas, and Kurt DeMaagd
9:30 AM - 10:30 AM Paper
Session I		 Connecting Bangladeshi farming communities with mobile telephony technologies: a proposed model
Bidit Lal Dey ( Queens University Belfast, UK)

Mobile Storytelling and Video Sharing for Inter-Cultural Communication: How Personal Expression Leads to Job Skill
John Kuner (Stanford University/ Project View, USA), Steve Vosloo (Stanford University, USA)

10:30 AM -
11:00 AM		 Tea Break  
11:00 AM -
11:30 AM		 Breakout
Session I		 Topic: Barriers to ICT Adoption in Emerging Markets
11:30 AM -
12:30 PM		 Paper
Session II		 Canadian Perspectives on Wireless Internet for Small Urban Businesses
Matthew Wong (University of Toronto, Canada)

Collaboration in Indian SME Clusters: A Case Study
Sarita Seshagiri, Shantanu Biswas and Soumya Roy (Motorola India Research Labs)
12:30 PM -
1:30 PM		 Lunch  
1:30 PM -
3:00 PM		 Paper
Session III		 An Open Distributed Identity and Trust Management Approach for Digital Community Ecosystems
M.Ion, L.Telesca, F.Botto (CREATE-NET, Italy), H.Koshutanski (University of Malaga, Spain)

The Relative Value of IT Investments
Kurt Demaagd (Michigan State University, USA)

How are the Information Technologies useful to an extensive and heterogeneous social network? The case of Equitable Trade
Olivier LEFEBVRE (France Telecom Orange Group)
3:00 PM -
3:30 PM		 Tea Break  
3:30 PM -
4:00 PM		 Breakout
Session II		 Topic: Prioritizing Research Agenda
4:00 PM -
4:30 PM		 Breakout
Session III		 Topic: ICT Application for Business Clusters
4:30 PM -
4:45 PM		 Closing
Remarks		  

The workshop will take place in Conference Room 61 on the lower level of the Kellogg Center

Participants

Workshop participants are requested to submit an abstract (max. 3 pages) to Soumya Roy at soumyaroy AT motorola.com by April 15, 2007. We will notify participants of the status of their submissions by May 1, 2007. Participants with accepted abstracts are required to submit full-papers by May 31, 2007. Abstracts and papers should outline an interesting research question, trend, or result relevant to the workshop theme.

Registration for the workshop is possible through the main website.

Organizer Background

Soumya Roy (soumyaroy AT motorola.com) is a senior researcher at Motorola India Research Labs, Bangalore. He earned his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from the University of California, Santa Cruz and BTech. in Electronics and Electrical Communication Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. Currently his research interest is towards developing communications technologies for the emerging regions, with special attention towards designing shared infrastructures for communities. He has actively worked in different aspects of wireless networking including routing, security, QoS and multiple access.

Shantanu Biswas (shantanu AT motorola.com) is a senior researcher at Motorola India Research Labs, Bangalore. He received his M.Sc.(Engg.) and Ph.D. in Computer Science from Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. He has also received M.Sc. in Operational Research from the University of Delhi. His current research effort is towards developing shared information and communications technologies infrastructure for the emerging economies. He is working towards developing trust based security infrastructure for enterprises. He is particularly interested in optimization and game theory.

Kurt Demaagd (kdemaagd AT msu.edu) is a faculty member of Telecommunications, Information Studies, and Media, Michigan State University. He earned his Ph.D. in Business Information Technology from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business. His primary research interest is on the use of information and communications technologies (ICT) in developing economies. He is particularly interested in the new models and methods necessary to study and understand the value ICT in emerging markets. In addition to studying developing economies, Kurt is also interested in how users participate in and manage online communities. Prior to returning to school to get his Ph.D., Kurt went to Hope College where he earned a B.S. in Computer Science; was the cofounder of Slashdot.org, a large online community; and was on the board of directors of the Perl Foundation, which owns Perl, a major open source programming language.

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