HCD Institute · Think tank

India by Design.

We connect India to the world through ideas and institutions: building India's intellectual soft power, and working with government to design a better India.

Partner with us Our engagements

4 regionsNordic · Asia Pacific · North America · Global South GovernmentAdvisory, programmes and public systems

DIC HubAcademic anchor at IIT Hyderabad

Since 2011The Institute of Human-Centred Design

Why India by Design

Soft power is built, not broadcast.

India has designed public systems at a scale no other country has attempted — digital payments, identity, healthcare and education for more than a billion people, under real constraint. That experience is a body of knowledge the world needs. We study it, teach it and carry it into rooms where institutions decide what to build next.

Think

Research and writing on designing for complexity, public systems and the Global South — India's experience turned into ideas others can use.

Connect

Institutional collaborations, roundtables and exchanges that link Indian government, universities and startups with their counterparts abroad.

Build

Work with government on programmes, pilots and standards, so ideas become better public services at home.

Our engagements

Four regions. One idea of India.

Each engagement pairs what India has learned with what a partner region does best, and ends in something concrete: a pilot, an exchange, a programme or a standard.

01 · Nordic

Ocean, energy and design, with Iceland, Denmark, Norway and Finland.

Through SethuIndia, our diplomacy arm, we host Nordic diplomats and businesses in Kerala and connect them with government, startups and investors. Our Nordic university pathway helps Indian graduates into leading design and sustainability programmes.

Nordic Blue Horizons — an Iceland-led roundtable at Huddle Global 2026, Kovalam
Blue economy, sustainable energy and eco-tourism with Kerala
University pathway with Iceland Design and Architecture

Nordic Blue Horizons Global Immersion

02 · Global South

Designing for the next six billion.

Most of the world lives with the constraints India designs for every day. We convene practitioners, researchers and policymakers from across the Global South to share methods built for scale, scarcity and diversity.

Global South Design Summit, with DIC Hub, IIT Hyderabad
Research and essays on frugal innovation and population-scale design
Inclusion and universal design as public infrastructure

The summit Read the thinking

03 · North America

Accessibility and human-centred public services.

We bring India's human-centred design practice to public agencies working on accessible digital and physical services, and bring back what works into Indian standards and programmes.

Digital accessibility for public agencies (WCAG, ADA Title II)
Accessibility assessment, governance and training
Exchange of public-service design practice

Government digital accessibility

04 · Asia Pacific

Public-service design across the region.

Asia Pacific governments are among the world's most ambitious users of design in public service. We are building exchanges with institutions across the region on public administration, education and innovation.

Design thinking in public administration, learning across the region
Education and innovation exchanges
Institutional partnerships in development

Public administration Partner with us

With government

Working with government to design a better India.

Ideas earn their place when they change how a public service works. We work alongside central and state institutions on policy, programmes and public systems.