Mookerjee Picked as First Director of New HBS India Research Center
After nearly two decades in senior marketing and new venture positions, Ajay Mookerjee (DBA ’88) has returned to HBS as executive director of the new India Research Center.
“I’ve had a pent-up desire to get involved in academic work, and this offer came at an interesting moment,” he explains. Mookerjee recently served as managing director of Capital One’s Asia business ventures, based in Bangalore, India. When that assignment ended in June 2004, he decided to remain with his family in India and subsequently launched an analytics offshoring business and joined several corporate boards. The offer from HBS, he says, came at a time when he was open to a new challenge.
Mookerjee lost no time planning a research agenda. He convened a series of campus-based meetings with 35 HBS faculty members interested in India research. From those discussions he identified interests in several broad categories, including innovation in the technology and biotech sectors, business models, and marketing strategies needed to reach India’s 600 million middle-class consumers. More than a dozen faculty members have already committed to specific research projects beginning in late summer, notes Mookerjee. By then, the research center will be open in Mumbai (formerly Bombay).
HBS now operates research centers in China, Europe, Latin America, and California, and has a research office in Japan. Together with the new India center, they are an essential component of the School’s commitment to a global presence in research and education. Each center is led by an HBS graduate from the region.
After earning his doctorate from HBS, Mookerjee worked in consulting with Booz Allen Hamilton and in investments with GE Capital. He then went on to develop corporate ventures in Asia for global insurer AIG and build the Asian credit card business for Capital One.
Commenting on his new position, Mookerjee looks forward to facilitating research projects in his home country. “It’s the right time to look at India seriously,” he says.
