Nitin Patel served for 18 years on the faculty of the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad. He examines the practical applications of operations research and statistical analysis for small samples. He won India's Vikram Sarabhai Medal for systems analysis research in 1985 and the American Statistical Association's Snedecor Award in 1988. Formerly the president of the Operations Research Society of India, Patel has also served as vice-president of the International Federation of Operational Research Societies. He helped create Tata Consultancy Services, a leading Indian software company, and co-founded Cytel Software, a Cambridge-based firm that develops state-of-the-art statistical software.