Eminent individuals selected for the prestigious Economic Times Awards Jury of India

N Chandrasekaran, Chairman, Tata Sons

Natarajan Chandrasekaran is Chairman of the Board of Tata Sons, the holding company and promoter of more than 100 Tata operating companies with aggregate annual revenues of more than US $100 billion. Chandrasekaran also chairs the Boards of several group operating companies, including Tata Steel, Tata Motors, Tata Power, and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS)-of which he was Chief Executive Officer from 2009-17. Under his leadership, TCS consolidated its position as the largest private sector.
Chandrasekaran has been awarded several honorary doctorates by leading universities in India and internationally. His business leadership has been recognized by several corporate and community organizations, and he has received numerous awards including Business Leader of the Year at the ET Awards for Corporate Excellence 2016, CNBC TV 18 – ‘Indian Business Icon’ in 2014 and CNN-IBN Indian of the Year 2014 (business category). Chandrasekaran shall chair the Jury for The Economic Times Awards for

Uday Kotak, Founder, Kotak Mahindra Bank

Uday Kotak is the Founder of Kotak Mahindra Bank. Under his leadership, over the past 35 years, the Kotak Group established a prominent presence in major areas of financial services including banking, stockbroking, investment banking, car finance, life, and general insurance and asset management. He was the recipient of the ‘Ernst & Young World Entrepreneur of the Year’ award in 2014, and ‘The Economic Times Business Leader of the Year’ award in 2015.

Rishad Premji, Chairman, Wipro

Rishad Premji is Executive Chairman of Wipro Limited, a $11 billion global information technology, consulting, and business process services company, with over 250,000 employees across six continents. As Wipro’s Chief Strategy Officer, Rishad conceptualized Wipro Ventures, a $250 million fund to invest in start-ups developing technologies and solutions that complement Wipro’s businesses with next-generation services and products. He was also responsible for investor and government relations for
Rishad is on the boards of Wipro Enterprises, Wipro-GE and the Azim Premji Foundation and also the Chairman of NASSCOM for financial year 2018-19. Prior to joining Wipro, Rishad was with Bain & Company in London, and worked with GE Capital in the US in the insurance and consumer lending spaces. He is a graduate of GE’s Financial Management Program.

Rishad has an MBA from Harvard Business School and a B.A. in economics from Wesleyan University in the US.

Arundhati Bhattacharya, Chief Executive Officer, Salesforce India

Arundhati Bhattacharya is the Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer for Salesforce, India. In her role, Arundhati oversees the growth strategy of the company and plays an integral role in defining Salesforce’s relationship with the ecosystem of customers, partners, and community across India.
“Generative AI is something that is going to change every single space of work in a very different way. Generative AI allows democratization of input as well as output. Therefore the number of data points in can handle is in billions and billions. It has democratized access to AI, which we never had earlier. Therefore it is very very powerful in the way we work and learn.” says Arundhati Bhattacharya, CEO-Salesforce India

Throughout Arundhati’s 40 years in the financial sector, she has also earned a string of accolades to her name, which include “The World’s 100th Most Powerful Women” by Forbes, “Top 50 globally most powerful women in business” and “World’s 50 Greatest Leaders” list by Fortune. Arundhati is the former first women Chairperson of the State Bank of India.

Prabha Narasimhan, CEO, Colgate-Palmolive India

Prabha Narasimhan joined Colgate-Palmolive in 2022 from Hindustan Unilever (HUL), where she led the Home Care category as Executive Director and served as a member of the HUL Leadership Team. Ms. Narasimhan has nearly 25 years of rich and varied experience in customer development, consumer marketing and innovation across geographies and multiple categories, including Home Care, Foods, Personal & Skin Care. She is a graduate of the India Institute of Management Bangalore and Melbourne Business.

Premiumization continues unabated. It grows rapidly. There are enough consumers in this country who have the money and the propensity to spend as well. There are a lot of businesses chasing those consumers and those consumers are responding by spending.” says Prabha Narasimhan, CEO – Colgate Palmolive India

Nithin Kamath, Founder, Zerodha

Nitin founded Zerodha in 2010 to tackle a decade-long business stint. Today, Swachayamjab is changing the broads of Indian transaction lenders and is one of India’s top net brokerages in comparable ranges with more clients than CR Plus operating a powerful ecosystem of investment platforms with millions of orders every day.

Nitin is also a member of SEBI Secondary Market Advisory Committee (SMAC) and Market Data Advisory Committee (MDAC). Led by Nitin Kamath, Zerodha also received the Startup of the Year Award at The Economic Times Startup Awards 2020.

Kunal Shah, CEO, CRED

Kunal Shah is an angel investor, founder of CRED and previously founded FreeCharge. He has served as a part-time partner at Y Combinator and an advisor at Sequoia Capital. In 2018 he set up CRED, an app where users can make credit card payments and earn rewards. Kunal also acts as a Business Advisor for Bennett Coleman and Co. Ltd. (Times Group) and AngelList.
Kunal also helps the entrepreneurial community by investing in multiple projects such as Unacademy, Shuttl, Razorpay, TVF, Rupeek and more.

Dr. Lakshmi Venu is also the Deputy Managing Director of TAFE Motors and Tractors Limited.

Dr. Lakshmi Venu is a graduate of Yale University and holds a Doctorate in Engineering Management from the University of Warwick. She underwent her initial training in Sundaram Auto Components Limited, a subsidiary of the Company. Thereafter, she underwent an extensive in-depth induction at the Company. She has worked in the areas of business strategy, corporate affairs, product design and sales & marketing of the Company and has been the Joint Managing Director of Sundaram Clayton Limited,

Source : Economics Times 21 December 2023