Amrita Hospital, Faridabad, world's largest..

The Amritha hospital (green building, limiting Carbon footprint and effluent discharge) that started construction in 2017, will finish construction in 2027 with 1 crore sq ft floor area, (10 million or 100 lakh sq ft) spread over 14 floors and a separate 4 floor Research centre (300,000 sqft with a total of 10 million sqft) offering 2400 beds.

The present global #1, First Affiliated Hosital in Zhengzhou, China with 7000 beds has a total of only 78 lakh sqft builtup area of hospital. 

 

The Amritha hospital in Kochi was the first hospital from Mata Amritanandamayi, the spiritual leader from Kollam Kerala, who shot to fame for her humanitarian work. Mātā Amritānandamayī Devī  was born Sudhamani Idamannel; 27 September 1953, often known simply as Amma ("Mother"), is a humanitarian and spiritual leader who could be listed foremost with Sri Sri Ravishankar and Jaggi Vasudev. 

 

Though Sri Sri Ravishankar based out of Bangalore runs Art of Living, the world's largest non governmental organisation and Jaggi Vasudev runs the Isha Foundation out of Coimbatore, two large organisations serving the spiritual needs of the people, they have not ventured at projects this big in size and stature.

Amrita hospital in Faridabad when fully complete in 2027 will have

• 8 Centres of Excellence
• 81 specialities
• 64 Operation theatres
• 534 ICU beds
• 10,000 staff
• 800 doctors
• Robotic testing labs
• 498 room visitor Guest House and 
• a helipad.

Helipad is common in all corporate hospitals that work for profit and not service. 

Each floor is 11 acres in area with 14 floors on a 133 acre area land in Sector 8 in Faridabad, Haryana.

When completed in 2027, as regards hospital built up space, the Amrita hospital will be 2.2 million sq ft larger than the present global #1, First Affiliated hospital in Zhengzhou, China.

 

Click here for more information from Financial Express.

India is the land of spiritual sages, the people who have known nature and God for centuries, has also been the land where maximum philanthropic activities have been undertaken by spiritual organisations. This centre gives us hope that our spiritiual leaders are indeed on the right path of service to society.  

 

With the example of Arvind Netralaya in Madurai housing the world largest, advanced and affordable eye care in the world offers 90% of its services free to the needy and poor patients, it has to be seen what percentage of patients coming to the Amrita hospital in Faridabad will be treated free, though we know approximately 20% of patients coming to the Kochi Amritha Institute of Medical Sciences, super speciality hospital get free treatment.

 

With Bureau of Energy Efficiency and GRIHA ratings for environmental management, Amrita hospital in Faridabad is going to set an example for hospitals around the world on using locally available materials for building construction, ensuring high quality of indoor environmental space, use of electric vehicles in the 133 acre campus, effective rainwater harvesting, effective waste treatment and waste management practices and so on. click here

In addition to being the world's largest hospital in terms of built up area (in First Affiliated hospital in Zhengzhou, it is told they have patient beds even under the staircase and in the corridors to make the numbers) Amrita Faridabad is also the world's largest green hospital with 

 

1. construction done using locally available building materials, 

2. large rainwater harvesting facilities, 

3. solar panels to generate electricity, 

4. excellent indoor environmental air quality with good cross ventilation and 

5. possessing excellent waste treatment facilities 

 

helping it earn GRIHA (Indian green building) certification too. I doubt whether any other global hospital has these superior green building standards. 🌹🙏 Hospitals around the world are known to be all-time environmental hazards..

When healthcare facilities of this magnitude take to healthy green practices, it gives great promise to the future citizens assuring them a great future and teaching them how economic and healthcare growth can indeed go hand in hand with healthy environmental practices.

I had the good opportunity to visit the Amrita School of Business at Ettimadai, Coimbatore early this year, being among the first Bschools in South India to get the much coveted and prestigious globally acclaimed AACSB accreditation. Click here for my write up on that visit and why Bschools need to go for accreditation.

 

George.

Walmart and Amazon, neck to neck ..

Walmart registered revenue of $572 billion in 2022, with profits of $13 billion and market capitalization of $355 billion. 

Amazon registered revenues of $470 billion profits of $33 billion (2.5x Walmart) and a market capitalization of $1200 billion , almost 4x Walmart.

It is just $100 billion revenue that separates Walmart and Amazon. Will 2023 be a great remarkable historical year for Amazon, the 1995 started

internet book company ?

Automated Amazon warehouses, a wonder and technology marvel..

My understanding of Amazon AI based automated warehouses all started with classroom discussions and with the fact that after an MBA from IESE Barcelona, my son was going to join Amazon in their warehouse in Manchester MAN8 for training.  

 

Kiva robots

When I went through Amazon site information and articles from technical sources on the Internet, the topic became more interesting which made me do research more and prepare this small write-up for my students. This is new knowledge, thought of sharing. 

 

The true fact is without AI and robot intervention, Amazon could never ever have imagined to handle 400 million item shipments a day around the world. Even humans have a limitation in handling products. Scaling up is a real challenge in large scale applications and AI based robots, is the only solution. Amazon is, no doubt, going to give leadership to the world in handling super large scale systems benefiting the public and adding value to the whole ecosystem.

Difference between conventional and modern warehouses : Conventional warehouses have fixed storage shelves and moving pickers. In Amazon we have moving shelves (mobile shelving units with moving robots under the shelves raising them) and human stowers and pickers. Lot of sensors and lights help stowers keep or stow and pickers pick right items from mobile shelves. 

Proteus robots

Amazon also has a different storage philosophy, dictated by its over dependence on AI. Unlike conventional warehouse shelves where all items of a fixed product type or manufacturer are grouped together, in Amazon warehouses they are randomly placed in different mobile shelves at different levels, decided by AI algorithms.

The AI algorithm decides where the similar items are to be kept, also helping pickers retrieve items faster. 🤔😳😟

 

Click here to find how Amazon Robotics develops sophisticated machinery and software to optimise efficiency at its fulfilment centres.

Meet Proteus, Amazon's first fully autonomous mobile robot, smart, safe and collaborative ... click here..

Proteus autonomously moves through our facilities using advanced safety, perception, and navigation technology developed by Amazon. The robot was built to be automatically directed to perform its work and move around employees—meaning it has no need to be confined to restricted areas. - www.aboutamazon.com

Click here to watch the video of old generation Kiva robots on the Amazon Fulfillment centre warehouse shopfloor. Amazon acquired Kiva systems in March of 2012 for about $770 million and this acquisition took Amazon warehouse automation to great heights. The Proteus introduction is to new levels unheard of.

The public fear that Amazon is replacing human workers is totally misplaced, according to Amazon insiders. The Amazon warehouse robots are only enabling the human workers inside the warehouses to do tasks with the help of these AI based robots, which otherwise would never have been possible. The real fact is automating the Amazon shop floor has helped them retain the existing warehouse staff and also increase the warehouse operations efficiency manifold.

 

Kiva robot

In spite of having about 5,20,000 robotic drive units around the world as of June 2022, Amazon has over the last couple of years added almost a million new jobs too.  Robots have helped ease the human's job and helped scale up Amazon's product handling to almost 400 million daily as of now. Click here for an article on the Amazon journey from Kiva to the more Proteus advanced robotic systems ..

Click here for an interesting Guardian article which exposes the risk the society now faces from too much automation at Amazon .. This article from Amazon (click here) traces their 10 year journey from 2012 to 2022 how robots helped them to trace, move the products and do it safely too.

Amazon would have been a great organisation with just robots, but to have AI and ML mediated robots has helped Amazon scale their operations to unheard of levels and they handle almost 400 million shipments daily across the world.

 

George..

Virginia Mason healthcare facility and Toyota Production system ..

I was giving a reading assignment for my fourth sem MBA Operations students in Lean Operations when I chanced upon an interesting reading material in the Operations management book by William J Stevenson on the Virginia Mason hospital in Seattle, Washington, USA. In 2021 it merged with CHI Franciscan to form Virginia Mason Franciscan Health. It was the first time I was reading of a healthcare facility taking up the Toyota production system that was used to produce cars, to improve the quality of healthcare in the healthcare sector.

Virginia Mason Hospital was founded in 1920 in Seattle, Washington (the place where Boeing planes are assembled in NW US) and continues as one of the prominent private no-profit healthcare facility in that state. Virginia Mason hospital has been recognised all throughout the one hundred and two years of it's existence to be the leader in bringing healthcare innovations in the healthcare sector.

Virginia Mason, ranked at #40 among the best hospitals in US, has been the leader in bringing the concept of team medicine in healthcare, where instead of each physician working independently, they brought the concept of team medicine, where the team of doctors would collaborate and find effective solutions of healthcare problems and issues

• In 1923, they were the first to introduce Insulin in treatment of diabetes, introduce Electro Cardio gram(ECG) 
  
• 1949 - allowing fathers in delivery rooms
• 1956 - VM Research Centre which encouraged everyone to ask questions, so that the next time, these questions are answered and forms the basis for its growth and development. That year also saw midwifery program being introduced in the hospital.
• 1980 saw the first insulin pump being used in the hospital, the first cochlear transplant in the ear being carried out. That year also saw the identification of genetic markers for Rheumatoid arthritis
• 1990 saw a skilled nursing support facility for people with aids opening up. Even though it had the risk of infection and reputational damage, the Bailey Bouchet centre has been one of the corner stones of VM healthcare facility
• 90s also saw the mobile mammography unit starting and the 1000th kidney transplant being done there. 90s also saw the first robot assisted prostatectomy surgery and the corona artery bypass surgery conducted there
  
• 1992 saw the VM production sytem improve the safety and quality of healthcare, while reducing the waste and costs from Toyota.

Organising annual innovation fairs to promote innovation, building things themselves to solve problems, an example is the therapy car which helps patients after knee cap replacement surgery to get onto a vehicle after their hospital stay to go home.

The suggestion scheme of Kaizen, to help make things better for the doctor, hospital and patients daily has benefited VM to offer world class healthcare to the people of Washington state. The spirit of innovation, commitment to quality and safety, an undiluted focus on opatients as the centre of everything theu do has taken Virginia Nason hospital to the heights it has reached now. 

Thanks to the Toyota Production system. 

George..

Blinkit, grocery delvery in the blink of the eye.

Technology has been the big motivator in the new world to add customer value which has seen many startups bloom across the world. One such startup that came up in North India started by two IIT graduates from IIT Delhi and IIT Bombay (my alma mater).

Blinkit (formerly Grofers) started by is a unicorn (valuation of more than a billion dollars) q-commerce (quick commerce) company that partners with local stores to ensure quick delivery of grocery items, veggies, fruits and cold storage items to your home in less than ten minutes. 

 

Even though Blinkit does not have own warehouses nor logistics services, but manages to provide you delivery within 10 minutes of placing an order at their website. Presently they serve select areas in select cities of the country.

How they do it with the help of modern technology in the blink of the eye, in less than 10 minutes, is a lesson for the world. Q-commerce is how they call it. They manage it through micro-warehouses (dark stores) spread across the city that stock more than 2000 of the more frequently required grocery items popular in Indian homes and which is put up on their website. This comfortable set is exactly what is needed in most Indian urban homes. They do not believe in well stocked large format warehouses, of the Walmart and DMart type. Though Zepto and Dunzo is already in the q-commerce market, Bigbasket, Swiggy are contemplating early moves lest they lose this market.

Is the billion dollar company waiting to be acquired by Amazon or Walmart ? How can it improve Walmart or Amazon's standing and market cap ?

Click here to understand more about the company and how it manages its operations. Click here for another doc explaining the logistics.

Anyway you look at it, the huge investments running into millions of dollars, is benefitting the customer, the common man in a great way. (recently Swiggy brought $700 million into their q commerce startup) 

 

The author stays in Electronic city phase 1 in Bangalore. It takes approximately 10 minutes for him to place the order each time by scrolling through the list and toselect the items based on availability, cost and quality. (twice every week). Another 2 minutes to make the payment. His experience over the past two months has been just exemplary. Within maximum 12 minutes he finds Blinkit delivers the order at his home. 

 

The quality of the items delivered by Blinkit is excellent, no pilferage, no error in the list and packing quantity (as different from my experiences with Amazon and Jiomart). The very courteous delivery boys make doubly sure to ascertain whether the ordert has been completely delivered. Most of the times Blinkit orders are delivered in closed/sealed paper bags, helping the environment and avoiding tendency of the delivery staff to pilfer.

The author is amazed as to how an Indian innovation in the organised retail industry, the Q commerce model, can bring more growth and innovation in this sector in the coming years across the world. It is also interesting to see how the likes of Amazon and Walmart will adapt or adopt this technological innovation by two IIT graduates that is taking India by storm.

George.

AACSB accreditation - Indian schools ..

 B-schools with AACSB accreditations in India are:

1. ISB Hyderabad
2. IIM Calcutta
3. XLRI Jamshedpur
4. SPJIMR Mumbai
5. IIM Indore
6. School of Business Management at NMIMS Mumbai
7. IMT Ghaziabad
8. TAPMI Manipal
9. IIM Udaipur
10. JAGSoM Bangalore
11. Amrita School of Business (ASB) Coimbatore
12. IIM Lucknow
13. SCMHRD Pune
14. ICFAI (IBS) Hyderabad
15. VIT Business School Vellore
16. Management Development Institute (MDI) Gurgaon
17. Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT)
18. International Management Institute (IMI) New Delhi
19. K J Somaiya Institute of Management Mumbai. (Above list is not in chronological order)

Alliance School of Business Bangalore is already a member of AACSB for the past two years and is looking at accreditation in the coming years.  

Why  accreditation ?

Accreditation pushes institutions to meet and maintain their high standards, in turn increasing trust and confidence in them among the public and boosting accountability. This helps potential students and their families to place a certain level of trust on the institution and course basis the accreditation received. - www.idp.com

Accreditation is a system for declaring that a program or institution meets established quality standards to provide assurance and confidence to the public.

Accreditation enables a member school to develop clearly defined goals and objectives based on its mission and philosophy. Accreditation is both a process and a status. It is the process of reviewing schools and their programs to assess their educational quality – how well they serve students and society.
 

Accreditation is the recognition from an accrediting agency that an institution maintains a certain level of educational standards. the accreditation process empowers higher educational institutions by helping them to analyze their loopholes, improve their academic structure, work on it, and gain trust amongst individuals. It provides institutions an opportunity to design their education and head in the direction of continuous improvement.

The goal of accreditation is to ensure that institutions of higher education meet acceptable levels of quality

Do we care to reduce our water footprint ?

Water footprint is the amount of water we use in our daily lives. The surprising fact about water is that it converts itself from one form to another, Fresh water to brown water in the kitchen, fresh water to sewage in the toilet and so on.

Do we have a water policy in our organisation ? Are we aware of the fact that water is never lost fromn this planet, only thing is it changes form from one to the other.

This HBR article (click here) by Will Sarni in August 2009 did throw some interesting insight into the aspect of water footprint and why we need to worry about it.