Looking back at an exciting weekend at Vijaybhoomi University where our founder, Preeti Vyas shared a glimpse into the rapidly evolving world and how it's the "most exciting as well as challenging times in history of the planet."
First of all, thank you Sanjay for having me here today. I am honoured to be here on Founders day, sharing the stage with dignitaries and of course, meeting all of you. By the way, I am here not just as a speaker today, but also as your neighbour. I have a farm just a few minutes away and this also gives me the opportunity to invite you all over for chai when I come here from Mumbai, which is almost every weekend.
But coming back to the event of the day. I want to say that as students, these are exciting times.
Looking back, when I was your age, I had just started as a student of the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad. And THAT was an amazing time for all of us there. A beautiful campus and an evolved curriculum which not just put us in touch with our Indian design roots, but also exposed us to immense possibilities through exposure of what was the best in the world. It infused us with a sense of purpose and a comprehension of the power of Design and how it could benefit the lives of people in a new post-Independence India. There was an awakening amongst the young Designers of being change agents and the roles and responsibilities that it would entail. It was indeed, a thrilling time.
And here you are today, students in the most amazing and perhaps the most exciting as well as challenging times in the history of the planet. We have seen the incredible disruption, or perhaps I should say creative disruption brought about by Covid and all its variants. It has forced change upon us unlike any other event in recent history. It has created new socio - economic structures, new life style patterns, new value systems, new learning opportunities and so on. And this churn isn’t over yet. We have seen only the beginning of what could be a world of new and visionary opportunities.
And now, we are entering into a whole new digital paradigm; into the Metaverse and it will be you, who will invent, create pathbreaking ideas and seize amazing opportunities as you navigate towards an incredibly exciting horizon that you will be the architects of.
In the last ten years, we’ve seen traditional banking go online, and online banking further evolve, with crypto currency now entering the financial stage. We are seeing artists starting to cash in on the digital revolution, with NFTs becoming new streams of revenue & recognition. We’ve seen big companies dismiss, then slowly embrace the power of design thinking, using tools from the designer’s toolkit to solve complex business problems. And, through the pandemic, we’ve seen a plethora of entrepreneurs and the birth of unicorns seizing opportunities through innovations in technology, healthcare, transportation, sustainability and more…
Who would have thought that a vaccine for a pandemic could have been developed and delivered in just over a year, when before Covid, this process has generally taken close to a decade. We are fast forwarding across all traditional timelines. And the future is here and now. The future is online and offline. The future is both in the metaverse and in the real world. It’s up to you to make the most of it, to make the most of the access to information & knowledge that you will gain here.
As students of this University, think of the immense new business ideas which would have never found a place before in the world.
As lawyers, you will be at the forefront of new legal scenarios you have never yet visualized.
As Designers, the world of design and design thinking just got enlarged to include new ways of living, communicating and consuming.
As musicians, you will create, invent and engineer new instruments, and music for a generation hungry for new sounds.
As data scientists, you will see & decipher patterns in numbers, and help influence, innovate and inform.
More importantly, as young leaders, you will inspire the next generation to follow their passions and chase their dreams, leading by example. The future is in your hands and it’s up to you to shape it.
I envy you for being at the epicentre of a new renaissance that all of you have the potential to create. And I wish you all the best.
