Infinite Vision

When a crippling disease shattered his lifelong ambition, Dr. V(enkataswamy) chose an impossible new dream: to cure the world of blindness. The Aravind Eye Care System reinvented the rules of business to restore sight to the blind. Based in India, it is the world's largest provider of eye care and delivers surgical outcomes that equal or surpass those of developed countries-at less than 1 percent of the cost. In thirty-five years it has treated over 32 million patients, the majority for a minimal fee or for free. Patients have the freedom to choose whether to pay, and there is no paperwork. Refusing to rely on donations, Aravind is self-sustaining and highly profitable. Its baffling model is the subject of a popular Harvard Business School case study and has won admiration from Peter Drucker, Bill Clinton, and Muhammud Yunus. Infinite Vision is the first book to probe Aravind's history and the distinctive philosophies, practices, and values that unleashed its phenomenal success.

The authors share Aravind's improbable evolution from an eleven-bed eye clinic founded by Dr. G. Venkataswamy, a retired surgeon with crippled fingers, no money, and a magnificent dream. Drawing inspiration from his spirituality and, of all things, the low-cost, high-volume, standardized approach of fast-food franchises, Dr. V. and his team (which includes thirty-five ophthalmologists from his family) created an organization that has treated everyone from penniless farmers to the president of India.

How does Aravind flourish while flouting conventional logic at every turn? What can enterprises worldwide learn from it? Infinite Vision reveals the power of a model that integrates innovation with empathy, service with business principles, and inner change with outer transformation. It shows how choices that seem naïve or unworkable can, when executed with wisdom and integrity, yield powerful results-results that light the eyes of millions.

Pavithra K. Mehta is a writer and award-winning filmmaker who has been collecting stories at Aravind ever since childhood. Suchitra Shenoy has over a decade of experience in the social sector and was a founding member of the Inclusive Markets team at the Monitor Group.