Rediff.com has an interesting article about Arvind Thiagarajan, a 25-year-old Indian entrepreneur who, having come up with a revolutionary (I know that word is overused, but really!) technique for lossless data compression, went on to found MatrixView, a company “specializing in providing data compression and optimization solutions” for medical imaging . Two things stand out. One, the technique was so simple and straightforward that the scientific community was astounded to the point of being sceptical. Two, he set up a company whose products fell into a niche area dominated by imaging giants with huge research budgets and with expansive patent portfolios, with a technique whose own patent is still pending. That takes guts.
Most admirable. What isn’t is the reaction of the typical Rediff reader to this news article, instantly dismissing it as a “hoax”. But here’s another angle on this issue.