IIT Madras and my memories

I earned my M.Tech (Mechanical) degree between January 1984 and June 1985. Earlier I did my B.E (Mech) from VNIT, Nagpur and Management at Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM), Pune. Before joining M.Tech I worked with Bajaj Auto Ltd., Pune for eighteen months.

Though I would have gone to other IITs, I was very clear that if I have to study Mechanical Engineering, I must go to IIT Madras, well known for the subject that time and even today.

I had wonderful opportunities to meet very talented professors like Dr V Radhakrishnan, Dr O V K Chetty, Dr Krishnamurthy, Dr Ramamurthy etc. All of these professors inspired me. Under the leadership of Dr V Radhakrishnan, 11th All India Machine Tool Conference was held and it gave me an opportunity to plan an event and also interact with global professors and guests.

Extra mural lectures arranged at IITM were excellent and gave very useful inputs during that time, the speakers were outstanding.

I had an opportunity to publish my first paper in NITIE’s journal in 1985 under the guidance of Dr. O V K Chetty, my thesis guide. I used an IBM 370 mainframe and punched cards for my thesis having simulations.

The campus memories are great. We had a lot of Deers in the campus, an excellent swimming pool, open air theatre, and a good library. Though I am a Maharashtrian, I loved the south Indian food at the mess. When I was at Kaveri Hostel, we didn’t have the ceiling fans, it was terrible in summer, evenings were good. I had memories of the village Velachery during those times; I heard it has developed into a great place now. Eating snacks, having coffee in the canteen near Alaknanda was great.

One thing I experienced was a lot of opportunities to learn, interact with faculties, visiting faculties, external speakers etc. at IITM.

I passed with flying colours with a CGPA of 9.98 and got the Dr Vaidyanathan Memorial Award also.

My tenure of eighteen months at IITM is a memorable one and I strongly feel I started with my dream job with Tatas and served them for almost ten years and then worked in USA, UK and in many MNCs, startups and other companies at CXO levels. I was also invited as visiting faculty to teach Information Technology subject to Global MBA students by a well-known MBA Institute in Dubai and served as mentor for EMBA students for six months at Asian Institute of Management, Philippines, Manila. I have three US patents and I must say IITM faculty was an inspiration for me to publish many papers in National and International Conferences and filing US patents.

Eighteen months at IITM had a tremendous impact on my career and achievements and one of the most memorable times I had in my life.

Laxmidhar V. Gaopande

M.Tech,ME,1985

 

I did my M.Tech in Production and Machine Tools from Mechanical Engineering  department at IITM from Jan 1984 to June 1985. I was first in the M.Tech batch with a CGPA of 9.98.  Prior to this I did B.E (Mech) from VNIT Nagpur with 4^th rank in the university and Management  Diploma from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM) Pune. 

I have 35+ years of impressive and successful career track record in IT industry especially in  product engineering and innovation, worked in USA and UK and with strong exposure to  multiple domains like Manufacturing, Automotive, Healthcare, Security, Hi-Tech, Govt., Defense,  Telecom, Oil & Gas, Power, Transportation, Utilities, Smart Cities etc. 

I have operated at various senior positions like GM, VP, President, CTO, COO, CEO, Chief IP  Officer (CIPO), Acting Managing Director (MD) and a Board Member. I have built successfully  many organizations from scratch, offshore development centers for Fortune 100 companies. I  was also involved in acquisitions of software assets as well as software companies from North  America, Canada, and Middle East etc. 

I have published many papers in national and international conferences and spoken in many  national and international conferences. I have three patents from the USA in imaging space. I was  invited as visiting professor to teach Global MBA students abroad in April 2008. I was a mentor  for EMBA students at Asian Institute of Management, Philippines, Manila for six months am also  a mentor for few startups. 

I am currently Co-Founder, Global CTO, COO and Chief Mentor of Cyber3ra (www.cyber3ra.com)  a startup in cyber security space, we are India’s most moderns SaaS based Bug Bounty Platform  and incubated at IIT Kanpur C3IHUB by SIIC.