Soumitra Dutta

Biography

Dutta was born in Chandigarh in 1963. He is the founding Dean of the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business at Cornell University, New York. Before his current role he became the eleventh dean of the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University. He previously served as the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Business and Technology, founder and academic director of the eLab at INSEAD, a top-ranked graduate business school in Fontainebleau, France.

Previous roles Dutta has held during his 22-year tenure at INSEAD include dean of external relations; dean of executive education; and dean of technology and e-learning. He has served as a visiting professor in the Haas School of Business at Berkeley, Oxford Internet Institute at University of Oxford, and Judge School at University of Cambridge in England. He has lived and worked in the U.S., Europe, and Asia, including stints as an engineer with GE in the U.S. and Schlumberger in Japan.

Dutta is an authority on the impact of new technology on the business world, especially social media and social networking, and on strategies for driving growth and innovation by embracing the digital economy. He is the co-editor and author respectively of two influential reports in technology and innovation the Global Information Technology Report (co-published with the World Economic Forum) and the Global Innovation Index (co-published with the World Intellectual Property Organization). Both reports have been used by several governments around the world in assessing and planning their technology and innovation policies.

Dutta's work has been widely published in both leading academic and management journals. Dutta and his ideas have been featured in myriad business magazines, newspapers, and blogs, including Global Intelligence for the CIO, Information Week, Brasil, BusinessWorld India, Chief Executive, Finance & Management, Chief Executive Magazine, Forbes, and The McKinsey Quarterly. He received the European Case of the Year from the European Case Clearing House in 2002, 2000, 1998, and 1997.

Dutta combines a rigorous academic perspective with rich practical experience from actual organizations. Dutta is a non-executive member of the board of two listed companies: Sodexo, a global food services and facilities management company, and Dassault Systemes, a leading technology company in 3D modeling and virtual reality. He is a member of the advisory boards of SWIFT Institute and several global business schools, including HEC Montreal (Canada), ESADE (Barcelona, Spain), and ESCP (Paris, France). He also serves as the Chairman of AACSB International, the largest global body of business schools. He has co-founded two firms, including Fisheye Analytics (later acquired by WPP group). He is also a member of the Davos Circle, an association of longtime participants in the Annual Davos meeting of the World Economic Forum, and has engaged in a number of multi-stakeholder initiatives to shape global, regional, and industry agendas

Dutta received a B.Tech. in electrical engineering and computer science from the Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi. He received an MS in business administration, an MS in computer science, and a PhD in computer science from the University of California at Berkeley. He is married to Lourdes Casanova, a native of Spain who is currently a lecturer at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, where she specializes in international business with a focus on Latin America and multinationals from emerging markets. The couple has a daughter, currently working as a research scientist at the FDA in Washington DC.

Current books

Professor Dutta has authored and co-authored several books, including the most recent, "Ask, Measure, Learn: Using social media analytics to understand and influence customer behavior", which distills experience from the real world of applying big data techniques to social media to provide valuable insights for executives. His previous book, “Throwing Sheep in the Boardroom: How Online Social Networking Will Transform Your Life, Work and World” (Fraser & Dutta 2008) investigated the implications of social network services for the enterprise which he co-authored with Matthew Fraser. Another of his recent books was more centered on leadership development, titled “Innovating at the Top: How Global CEOs Drive Innovation for Growth and Profit” (Berger et al. 2008) which was co-authored with Roland Berger, Geoffrey Samuels and Tobias Raffel.

In addition, every year Dutta co-authors “The Global Information Technology Report” published by the World Economic Forum, and the "Global Innovation Index" published by the World Intellectual Property Organization. The Global Information Technology Report is the world's most comprehensive and authoritative international assessment of the impact of Information and communication technologies (ICT) on the development process and the competitiveness of nations. Now in its 10th edition, the Global Innovation Index has established itself as a premier reference among national innovation metrics and as a tool to facilitate public-private dialogue and evidence-based policymaking. The theme of the 2017 edition of the Global Innovation Index, ‘Innovation Feeding the World’, explores innovation in agriculture and food systems.

Dutta's goals at Cornell University

Dutta’s goals at Cornell University focus on the establishment of an integrated Cornell SC Johnson College of Business with the transformative excellence, scope and scale to cement the University’s position as a world-class center of teaching and research for business management and entrepreneurship. The SC Johnson College comprises Cornell’s three accredited business programs: the School of Hotel Administration, the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, and the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management. Each school will maintain its unique identity and mission, while their collective capabilities will be strengthened by bringing together faculty, curricular offerings, and programs within a cohesive College. The SC Johnson College is one of the most comprehensive business schools in the nation with 240 faculty and nearly 2,900 undergraduate, professional, and graduate students.

Current affiliations

Dean, Cornell SC Johnson College of Business

Chairman, AACSB International

Non-executive member of Board, Sodexo

Non-executive member of Board, Dassault Systemes

Non-executive member of Board, Tower Learning Solutions

Member of International Advisory Board, Swift Institute

Member of International Advisory Board, Porto Business School

Member of International Advisory Board, ESADE, Barcelona

Member of International Advisory Board, ESCP, Paris

Member of International Advisory Board, HEC Montreal

Member of Board of Trustees, Bankinter Foundation, Madrid

Member of Board of Directors, The Case Centre

Member of Scientific Advisory Board, ISDI (Instituto Superior para el Desarrolla de Internet), Madrid

Member of Advisory Board, Lisbon Council, Brussels

Dutta in the media

Profile page

Videos