Consortium backed by 10 biz leaders to hold inaugural quality symposium

The Indian Foundation for Quality Management (IFQM) — a not-for-profit consortium backed by 10 of the country’s most influential business leaders — will host its inaugural symposium  on 15th  October in Delhi aiming to foster a culture of quality and innovation across key sectors like electronics, IT/ITES, automotive engineering, aerospace, life sciences, and pharma.

These 10 business moguls are Venu Srinivasan, chairman emeritus, TVS Motor; N Chandrasekharan, chairman, Tata Sons; Dilip Shanghvi, MD, Sun Pharma; Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, executive chairperson, Biocon; T V Narendran, MD and CEO; Tata Steel; K N Radhakrishnan CEO, TVS Motor; Randhir Thakur, CEO, Tata Electronics; Salil Gupte, president, Boeing India; S N Subrahmanyan, chairman and MD, Larsen and Toubro; and Vivek Chand Sehgal, chairman, Samvardhana Motherson International.

They have collectively  invested Rs 250 crore (Rs 25 crore each) on behalf of their respective company, and plan to bring in more like-minded business leaders as equity partners in IFQM.

According to Soumitra Bhattacharya, CEO and director of IFQM and former MD of Bosch India, the organisation is committed to putting the nation first and industry second. “We wanted the Governing Council to set the tone by investing the initial equity. The next step will be to bring on board other leaders who share our commitment to quality,” Bhattacharya explains. IFQM has already set up an office in Bengaluru and is planning a dedicated “IFQM Academy for quality and excellence”, expected to be operational within the next year and a half. 

IFQM’s upcoming symposium in Delhi, scheduled for October 15, will set the stage for in-depth discussions across six strategic sectors. The event has drawn interest from around 50 companies and will host 250 delegates. Bhattacharya says the goal of these discussions is to establish a reality check on current quality standards and chart a way forward. “We don’t have a formula. Japan and the US took nearly 30 years… Focus on quality did not happen in a year,” he emphasises.

IFQM has already launched knowledge-sharing initiatives among CEOs from founding companies like Tata Steel, TVS Motor, and Motherson Sumi. These exchanges are designed to elevate quality standards across the board, says Bhattacharya. The same model will soon be extended to small and medium enterprises (SMEs).

Bhattacharya further notes that IFQM is looking at the “big Q” of quality, which covers all aspects: Quality of strategy, processes, policy deployment, goals, customer relations, R&D, manufacturing, etc. “We will look at all sectors and not only manufacturing,” he adds.