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I n the summers of 2013 and 2014, Gita Surie, Ph.D., professor in the , went to India on a Fulbright Fellowship. The focus of her research was renewable energy and its potential for supplying the needs of rural villages without access to power or other essential services.

鈥淚ndia has been growing fairly rapidly in the last decade,鈥� she explained, 鈥渁nd the need for energy is increasing. Per capita energy consumption is much lower in India than in other parts of the developed world.鈥� In her field work, Dr. Surie examined the ways that biomass and new types of biofuels were being deployed, and the new technologies that were being implemented to make renewable energy available to rural populations largely off the power grid.

In the process, Dr. Surie鈥檚 observations sent her research in an interesting direction.

鈥淲hat I found,鈥� she said, was that in developing a rural market, 鈥測ou basically need to create an ecosystem.鈥�

An 鈥渆cosystem,鈥� in Dr. Surie鈥檚 terms, is a network of different types of organizations and agencies, including governmental sectors and NGOs (non-governmental organizations). To some extent, it is a question of scale: Large businesses and corporations are often less flexible than smaller organizations and find it difficult to provide services to remote, off-the-grid villages.

To Dr. Surie鈥檚 increasing interest, her research pointed to the NGO sector鈥斺�渨hich I had never paid much attention to in the past鈥濃�攁s a prominent component of the supportive organizational ecosystem. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e the ones who actually provide the outreach to villages,鈥� she explained. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e the last link to the rural market.鈥�

In her writing, Dr. Surie has emphasized the importance of this organizational support. Her paper on 鈥淓cosystem Creation and Organizational Form: Insights from Renewable Energy in Rural India鈥� was presented at the 2014 conference of the International Association for Management of Technology (IAMOT), and her paper for the 2015 conference focused on the organizational diversity required for a successfully supportive ecosystem. She is a guest editor on a forthcoming special issue of the journal Technological Forecasting and Social Change, focusing on National Systems of Innovation and Social Entrepreneurship.

鈥淚t鈥檚 not just one thing that drives the adoption of innovation,鈥� Dr. Surie said. And that, she suggested, is an interesting finding in itself.