Last week a group of us from Hitachi Data Systems toured the archeological remains of the ancient Greek and Roman city of Ephesus on the coast of Anatolia in Turkey. Ephesus was one of the greatest cities in the world in 100 BC and was famous for the Temple of Artemis, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
When the world population was about 300 million, Ephesus had a population over 250,000, making it one of the largest cities of that time. On the tour we saw paved streets, water systems, baths, toilets, odiums, a 25,000-seat coliseum, and a large library.
What struck me about this tour was the social innovation that went into its infrastructure. Paved streets provided a transportation system that facilitated commerce. Water systems, baths and toilets provided the sanitation that enabled a large population to live and work together. Odiums were meeting places where ideas could be communicated and governance could be debated. The coliseum provided a sense of community for tens of thousands. The library was built to store 12,000 scrolls of information and was the IT center of its day. Many different ancient armies, including the Persians and Romans, invaded Ephesus but they continued to survive until the social infrastructure began to break down. Fires, earthquakes, and finally the silting over of its harbor brought about its extinction.
Ephesus was a great city because of social innovation. Rome was a great empire because of their social innovations in building roads and aqueducts. Throughout history, social innovation has been a key driver for advancements in civilization and that is why Hitachi has focused on social innovation as a corporate strategy since 2006. Hitachi had grown into 900+ business units, serving diverse sectors, which included power systems, appliances, transportation systems, medical and life sciences, advanced materials, construction equipment, data centers, information and communications technologies, and much more. Hitachi adopted social innovation at that time to stabilize its business performance and create a foundation for long-term growth based on the vision of contributing to the solution of fundamental global challenges. Hitachi wanted to ensure that the new strategy of social innovation provided a platform for innovation and sustained growth.
This year, Mr. Nakanishi, CEO of Hitachi, Ltd., laid out a new plan for 2015, which adds new focus to the social innovation strategy. He is putting a heavy emphasis on linking information processing technologies with social infrastructure systems. In a recent speech that was given to new employees in April, Nakanishi said:
“The term ‘social innovation’ combines the terms ‘social infrastructure’ and ‘innovation’. It means that we will organically link information processing technologies with social infrastructure systems – such as electric power, information and telecommunications, railways, and urban development – and enhance these functions to provide valuable products and services. Rather than simply manufacturing and delivering products, we will accurately anticipate and identify the issues that our customers are facing to achieve optimum solutions that meet the needs of the customers and the regions in question. To do this we will make full use of the technologies, knowledge, and expertise that we have cultivated up to now.”
So why was this group of people from Hitachi Data Systems touring this ancient city of Ephesus? This tour was part of the Circle of Excellence event that is held every year to acknowledge the achievements of the past year and to thank our top achievers and their life partners who support them in their efforts. This brings together all our sales leaders across Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas to share successes and celebrate as one family. This year we also saw the changing of the guard as Randy DeMont, our global head of sales, retires and is succeeded by Michael Cremen who came up through the ranks from district sales in the U.S., head of Asia Pacific, and global accounts.
We thank Randy for his contributions to our success and wish him the best in the next chapter in his life. We also look forward to new successes as Michael leads us in the execution of our Social Innovation strategy.
