Singapore - The technology futurepreneur

He is the new citizen here who is trying to make things happen on the technology front.

Dr Bhupendra Kumar Modi moved to Singapore in 2008 and made the headlines when he bought a penthouse at The Sail @ Marina Bay for $15.46 million.

He had told tabla! then that he was pulling out of the United States and wanted to make Singapore his global headquarters.

The business magnate from the famed Indian Modi family had been operating out of Beverley Hills, where he had a mansion - an 8,000 sq ft house with five bedrooms and a pool.

Dr Modi has not only kept his word, he has gone beyond that.

He is now a Singapore citizen.

While chatting with tabla! at his private office in OUE Bayfront about his new Global Innovation Centre at Ubi, the topic about his commitment came up.

And, fishing out his pink IC from his waistcoat pocket, Dr Modi said he now has even more reason "to commit my efforts to Singapore and to invest here".

After selling his India-based Spice Communications to Idea Cellular for nearly US$600 million in 2007, Dr Modi set his sights on this region.

He first took a big stake in local Internet telephony company MediaRing for about $60 million in 2009 and later renamed the company Si2i.

Dr Modi's company has made a number of acquisitions since 2010.

It snapped up Malaysian mobile phone service company CSL and Thai handset company NewTel Corporation, and followed it up with the purchase of Indonesian handset distributor Affinity Group.

He has also been active on the philanthropy front.

Last year in April, he donated $500,000 to the President's Challenge and more recently he gave $1 million for the Indian Heritage Centre.

He has also been investing in properties.

In addition to the penthouse at The Sail, he has seven others in Singapore and is renting a few.

But right now, it is the Global Innovation Centre that he is excited about.

Part of the money he got from selling his telecom company in India has been invested in the centre, which has cost about $50 million.

Dr Modi sees himself as a "technology futurepreneur", a man who is always seeing the cutting edge in technology as the future.

He introduced photocopying to India and later was in the forefront of the telecom wave.

His latest venture - it involves using the Internet to deliver content - is the future, he says.

"When I got out of the telecom sector in India, I realised that the operator is going to be a tube while the content and the Internet would be the future.

As an operator, we had reached a peak.

Similarly, when I realised that copiers are no longer going to be the key in offices, I got out. Every technology has a life," he says of his decision to quit as a telecom operator.

"Innovation means you get out of one technology and then get into another. To get into another technology requires a build-up which takes years of risk-taking and I am in that mode now," he adds.

Dr Modi feels that personal computers are going out and TVs too may be on the way out and "the small screen is going to become big".

He forsees many companies going bankrupt as innovation is taking over.

Phone operators are waking up to this reality as they are the ones supporting old technology, he says, pointing out how Apple fought the operators by going straight to the customer and scored big becoming a trillion dollar company in the process.

His own Si2i is not doing well now but Dr Modi has an explanation.

A chemical engineer by training, who holds an MBA and a PhD in financial management, says: "It is a painful year but next year we will come back and become profitable. It always happens when you move into a new technology."

He admits that the company is struggling a bit but believes it is in the right field: "It is a hockey stick period. We have closed the past and we are coming in with new technology. We are moving into mobile Internet and 4G technology and plan to offer products which are a lot less costly than what is available in the US."

As he prepares to leave for another meeting, he says he is heading to Japan soon to study the changes happening there.

"I am a traveller and so I am constantly on the move. Technology is my passion," he claims.

That, he says, is how he relaxes but his son-in-law tells me later that Dr Modi hardly relaxes.

He says the 63-year-old is always busy from 6am to about 11pm.

Patrick Jonas

AsiaOne

Business & Investment Opportunities 
YourVietnamExpert is a division of Saigon Business Corporation Pte Ltd, Incorporated in Singapore since 1994. As Your Business Companion, we propose a range of services in Strategy, Investment and Management, focusing Healthcare and Life Science with expertise in ASEAN. We also propose Higher Education, as a bridge between educational structures and industries, by supporting international programmes. Many thanks for visiting www.yourvietnamexpert.com and/or contacting us at contact@yourvietnamexpert.com