S. Raman, one of the founder-promoters of HCL – then Hindustan Computers Ltd – and a pioneer of the Indian infotech industry passed away on July 7 at the age of 69.

He was – like others in the team that founded and promoted HCL -- an engineer at DCM, before helping 34 years ago, to create one of the most resilient Indian computer companies. As Technical Director he helped to conceptualize many of the early products of the company which included India’s first micro computer as well as the  first desktop PC -- the HCL Workhorse -- to be offered to Indian customers – even before the IBM PC. Some of his ideas like Relational Data Bases; Application Code Generators were ahead of their time.  A low key personality, his name rarely appeared in  the media  -- yet his colleagues cherish his contributions to HCL's growth in the crucial years.

When HCL forayed into IT services as a business, Raman was responsible for architecting the business and translating the IT services vision to reality; a task which he did very successfully as President and COO of HCL Technologies Ltd till he retired in 2005 on health grounds.

He rejoined the company two years ago to lead HCL’s and the Shiv Nadar Foundation’s internal infrastructure projects.

Shiv Nadar, Founder, HCL and Chairman, HCL Technologies Ltd said, “A soft spoken technocrat who led from the front, Raman will always be remembered for his gentle leadership, expansive vision and inspiring personality. He was my sounding board for more than 38 years and I will miss both his wisdom and his company”. 

July 8 2010