Vickram Crishna is a familiar figure both in India and abroad. He has interviewed and written on most of the best-known people in the business of information technology and management over the past few years.

Some names: Paul Allaire (Xerox), Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer (Microsoft), John Patrick (IBM), Henry Schacht (Lucent), ...

His career spans service in both multinational and Indian companies, publicly and privately owned. He has been a practitioner and a commentator on both technology and management practices.

He has led several design projects over the past two and a half decades. Currently, he is involved with the development of the Hawking Communicator, software designed to replace the traditional point-and-click computer interface paradigm. This solution looks first to assist people with severe disabilities, who are severely handicapped by current graphic computing systems. However, it may find wider acceptance as a breakthrough in natural language limitations.

His association with the world of information technology ranges back to the setting up of India's first computer retail chain, Computer Point. Since then he has immersed himself in modern Indian management methods, resulting in a book that drew richly from total quality management in a high profile joint venture company.

His regard for information technology then emerged in a second book on the popular consumer operating system Windows 98. He is currently researching a forthcoming book on retailing in India.

In the '90s, he worked as a writer and editor with Technocrat and Business India magazines. The latter has been India's most authoritative voice on business and the economy for two decades. This experience in media has now led to active work in rural India, where Radiophony, a technology leading company, has built India's first government supported community communication center, using ordinary FM to take local village created audio programming to the people.

Using available technology and methodologies creatively and innovatively to manage with economy and efficiency is a feature of Crishna's approach to solution-building. His academic learning includes post-graduation from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, which he did directly after completing his engineering degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, in the mid-70s.

As an industrial designer, he has developed and produced designs for packaging of consumer and industrial goods, retail and merchandising ware and office hardware. He has also planned and managed rollouts from engineering product lines to consumer packaged goods.

He has played a major role in corporate strategizing and project implementation for traditional as well as new media as businesses, aside from his work in recording and commenting in print on the field.