Hewlett-Packard Labs in India

HP created a presence for its research division, HP Labs, in India in 2002.[1] The mission for the new division was to create technology inspired by problems in countries such as India.

The first stated mission of the lab was

[2] "to generate innovations targeted at the world's emerging economies by understanding relevant social, cultural, economic and technological drivers." The mission morphed over time as follows.
  • In 2006, the mission statement read as:[3] "HP Labs India is focused on creating new technologies for addressing the IT needs of the next billion customers for HP."
  • In 2013, the mission statement read as:[4] "to create break-through innovations that enable HP to lead in the new wave of opportunities from rapidly growing economies."

Technology demonstrators

The lab created concepts for simplifying computer and Internet interactions. Gesture KeyBoard (GKB)[5] was an early attempt by the lab to create a pen-based local-language-interaction-support for PCs.

Since low-cost mobile phones without data-plan were being used in higher volume in India, the lab developed a solution that can enable mobile users with only voice and SMS services to access websites. The technology was called SiteOnMobile.[6]

Another hypothesis generated about technology in the Indian market was that many people in India own high-end Television and smart mobile phones, especially with the advent of Google Android phones. A new technology hypothesis was created so that Internet access to a large number of households and small-or-medium enterprises could be realized using a TV-connected broad-band device. The technology that demonstrated the efficacy of the hypothesis was called HP set-top box[7] and Vayu Internet Device (VIND).

The latest technology demonstrator was in the area of education called VideoBook,[8] which aimed to reduce the cognitive load on text-book learning by automatically augmenting text-book content with videos from the Web.

Research Management

In 2002, research was organized into research areas as follows:

In 2013, research was organized into research projects as follows:

  • Future school
  • Crowd Cloud
  • Smart Mobile Services
  • Interaction Technologies

Although the technique for research management changed, the focus of research remained creation of technologies for emerging markets.

References

  1. ^ "H-P Labs India inaugurated". The Times of India. Feb 25, 2002. Archived from the original on April 11, 2013. Retrieved 27 March 2013.
  2. ^ "HPL India's 2002 Webpage". Internet WayBack Machine. Archived from the original on March 7, 2002. Retrieved 27 March 2013.
  3. ^ "HPL India's 2006 Webpage". Internet WayBack Machine. Archived from the original on September 2, 2006. Retrieved 27 March 2013.
  4. ^ "HPL India's 2013 Webpage". Internet WayBack Machine. Archived from the original on January 15, 2013. Retrieved 27 March 2013.
  5. ^ "HP Labs India shows off tech goodies". CNET. April 6, 2006. Retrieved 27 March 2013.
  6. ^ "From the Labs: Information Technology". MIT Technology Review India. August 2010. Retrieved 28 March 2013.
  7. ^ "HP India brings Internet TV for the masses". The Times of India. Jan 17, 2012. Archived from the original on March 19, 2012. Retrieved 28 March 2013.
  8. ^ "HP Technology Scours the Internet for Video Related to Study Topics". PCWorld. Aug 15, 2012. Retrieved 27 March 2013.