Somewhere off India’s coast, mangroves grow where most plants cannot — in saltwater, shifting tides, and storms. They bend, adapt, and thrive in uncertainty.
Dr. Vishal Sikka, one of the most visionary minds in enterprise technology, believes our digital systems should do the same.
I recently watched his dAIlogues conversation with Alok Goyal, and it felt less like an interview and more like a masterclass in how to think about technology in uncertain times. From SAP HANA to Infosys to Vianai, Sikka’s journey captures how enterprise software evolved — and where it must go next.
1. AI Is Probabilistic. Enterprises Are Not.
This is the line that defines the entire conversation and perhaps, the next decade of enterprise design.
AI is powerful, but it’s also probabilistic meaning it works on likelihood, not certainty. Enterprises, on the other hand, run on determinism systems must be reliable, secure, and predictable.
That’s why Vishal Sikka warns against treating AI like a magic oracle. It’s not omniscient, it’s statistical.
“AI is probabilistic. Enterprises are not.” — Dr. Vishal Sikka
At Vianai, his team builds knowledge models that act like guardrails around AI, ensuring systems recognize when they’re on “thin ice” and communicate uncertainty instead of fabricating confidence. That’s architecture, not algorithms – trust engineered into design.
2. Simplicity Is the New Scale
Sikka calls out what many of us quietly observe: too many “lazy products.” Systems overloaded with features, integrations, and bureaucracy — products that drain energy rather than create value.
He contrasts this with India’s GSTN system, which handles over a billion daily transactions seamlessly. That’s simplicity at scale — efficiency as elegance.
In an age of AI-generated everything, efficiency has become the real innovation.
As architects and leaders, our job is not to add layers — it’s to strip away what doesn’t serve clarity.
3. Enterprise-Grade AI Needs Enterprise-Grade Culture
“Move fast and break things” sounds exciting until you’re managing payroll for a million people or running a country’s tax network.
Enterprise technology isn’t a playground for experimentation. It’s a backbone for society.
That’s why Sikka believes AI needs an enterprise culture — one that values accuracy, security, and ethics as much as speed.
The future of AI isn’t just about models or data. It’s about the mindset of the people who build and deploy them.
4. The Shift from People-Scale to AI-Scale
Sikka made an observation that hit close to home.
The services industry that powered India’s tech revolution for decades was built on people-scale: more projects, more hiring, more delivery centers.
That model is reaching its limit.
The next era will be about AI-scale. Smaller teams, higher leverage, deeper expertise. The goal won’t be to replace people but to make them ten times more capable.
Imagine a world where AI handles the routine and humans handle the meaningful. That’s where we’re heading.
5. India’s AI Advantage
Sikka’s optimism about India is infectious. He insists that India is “large enough, broad enough, and deep enough” to build not just AI applications but foundational models of its own.
Our diversity, data scale, and digital public infrastructure (like the India Stack) create an unparalleled sandbox for innovation.
India doesn’t need to copy Silicon Valley. It can lead – if we architect for our context, not someone else’s playbook.
6. AI Should Empower, Not Replace
Sikka dismisses the myth of “superintelligent AI.” It’s not a digital god – it’s an advanced calculator.
But he warns that the first people to feel the heat will not be factory workers. It will be knowledge workers – developers, analysts, consultants — anyone whose tasks can be predicted by patterns.
That’s where leaders must act. We must redesign work so that AI doesn’t replace intelligence, but releases human potential.
AI should take away the mechanical so that people can focus on the meaningful — creativity, empathy, and ethics.
7. The Mangrove of Technology
If there’s one image that sums up Sikka’s wisdom, it’s the mangrove — stable yet adaptive, rooted yet responsive.
In a world of constant flux, the future belongs to leaders and systems that embody this mangrove mindset. We don’t need perfect systems. We need systems — and people — that learn, flex, and endure.
As an enterprise architect and technologist, I find this deeply resonant. The role of technology is not to make humans obsolete. It’s to make humans more creative, conscious, and capable.
Because just like the mangrove, the most resilient architectures — and organizations — are the ones that grow stronger in uncertainty.
My reflection
Listening to Vishal Sikka reminded me why I fell in love with technology in the first place. It’s not about the tools; it’s about the possibilities.
We often say “AI is coming,” but the truth is, it’s already here.
The question is whether we’re building it to replace us or to raise us.
If we choose the latter, the future looks a lot more human.
Thank you!
Vinit