As the Chief Marketing Officer of Wipro’s IT business, and previously as the Global Brand Manager at Infosys, Jessie Paul has used marketing innovations to communicate brand values in a frugal, yet effective manner.

She quit Wipro Technologies, to start her own enterprise focused on providing a marketing backbone for B2B brands. "India has a fairly immature marketing ecosystem for B2B brands ... we are good at innovation but not at marketing. I want to help change that through (her new firm) Paul Writer Strategic Advisory, she says. She plans to be a trusted advisor to emerging B2B brands, providing them with strategic marketing advice, crash courses and by building a network for B2B marketers to brainstorm. The vocational coffee planter has given a personal touch to her new company's name. Over a century ago, her grandfather was a writer, a trusted executive on an estate who took care of everything from marketing crops to accounts. It's the same kind of trust Paul now wants to build with her future clients

Keshav Baljee is currently President and Co-Promoter of Royal Orchid Hotels Limited. He is deeply involved in driving the expansion process of the group, to achieve its immediate goal of a pan-India presence by 2010. He not only designed the group’s ambitious expansion strategy, he is also instrumental in turning the group into a hotel development company from an operating one. His involvement in expansion extends to include evaluating and selecting from the funding sources in the market. His role in the company diversified when he recently took on the role of directing various PR, HR and marketing initiatives within the organization.

An alumnus of the Wharton School, USA and the Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad, Keshav has a strong academic background in finance and corporate strategy. He has a background as an Investment Banker, and has worked with Lehman Brothers and UBS in the mergers and acquisitions department prior to returning to India.

Deepesh Garg is one of the co-founders of o3 Capital and currently heads the Consumer and Media practices at the firm. His transaction experience includes Career Point, CKiran has been a pioneering figure in the Indian venture capital industry. He started the venture capital business of ICICI and managed it during the first eight years. Later, he was a partner at Draper International, a venture firm based in San Francisco , which invested in India and the US. Prior to starting the Kaati Zone venture, he was a co-founder of Jumpstartup, a venture firm that invested in technology businesses both in India and the US. During his career, he helped several entrepreneurial businesses by providing start-up and early-stage capital and brought the initial successes of venture capital industry to public markets. Kiran is a chemical engineer from IIT Kanpur and holds a post-graduate diploma in management  from University of Mumbai.

Bijou Kurien has about 27 years of experience in Indian Industry. A post graduate in Management from XLRI, India; he joined Hindustan Lever Ltd., as a management trainee in 1981. After a successful stint of 6 years in various capacities in Sales, Marketing and Projects, he joined Titan Industries Ltd., India’s leading manufacturer and marketer of watches and jewellery. He was part of the team which set up Titan. He also headed the team which established Timex Watches Ltd. in India. During his stint of 19 years with Titan Industries, he held various positions in Sales, Marketing, International operations, Manufacturing etc. When he left in April 2006, he was the COO of the Watch & Clock division of Titan. He joined Reliance Industries in their newly created Retail division and heads the Lifestyle vertical in this retail initiative. Reliance has embarked on a transformational initiative in the Indian retail industry and has already created a significant impact in the market.

Bijou is also President of the XLRI Alumni Association, on the advisory board of the World Retail Congress, President of the Bangalore chapter of the XLRI Alumni association, member of the FICCI Retail committee and managing committee of the Bangalore Management Association.

For over fifteen years Health Care Global Enterprises has been defining the future of cancer care in India by designing, building and managing cancer centers with a steadfast vision : to transform cancer care environment by bringing core clinical services to one central place. The intent of this single place is to help patients achieve longer, better lives - and to improve cancer care one center at a time.

At HCG we view each center as a model of excellence. A place where physicians can achieve professional fulfillment and breakthroughs in patient care. We are committed to creating an environment that fosters the professional and personal achievements of each person who crosses the threshold of a center. And by sharing these achievements across the network, the achievements of each center, each physician, and each hospital are further heightened. Patients are the beneficiaries of these achievements - every accomplishment brings us one step closer to our ultimate goal of longer, better lives for cancer patients and their families.

Health Care Global Enterprises has grown rapidly and is currently a leader in cancer care, managing a network of fifteen cancer centers that span the country. Each center is provided with a business system, management expertise and capital resources to bring patient focused, state - of-the art cancer care to new regions of the countryI encourage you to learn more about Health Care Global Enterprises and to share in our dream of making cancer history.

Gopal is the founder and a Chairman of TVS-Electronics, Director of Sundaram-Clayton Ltd, and several other TVS Group businesses. Gopal has incubated over eight businesses, and has over twenty five years of operational experience in India, along with a wide network of relationships across the world. Gopal has been serving as the Board member of several Indian companies further, he was the Chairman of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Tamil Nadu State Council for the fiscal year 2007-08.  He is also the Chairman for India-Taiwan task force at CII National Council. He has served as the President of Manufacturers’ Association for Information Technology (MAIT) for the fiscal year ‘95-96. Gopal earned a B.Com from Loyola College, Chennai and an MBA from University of Michigan, USA.

Over the course of his career, Gopal has founded several companies operating in diverse sectors including computer peripherals, technology, financial services, and auto components. Many of these businesses started by Gopal are operational today, and a professional management team is in place to run these businesses. TVS Electronics, a company he established in 1986 has revenue of about Rs.191 crores in 2008-09. The company provides transaction automation products and has market leadership position in the dot-matrix printer segment. Another business that Gopal started, Harita Seating, is in the business of manufacturing and supplying vehicle seats and has sales of Rs.198 crores in 2008-09. Other companies that Gopal has founded and are currently operational include TVS Finance & Services, Harita Plastics, TVS-E Technology, TVS-E Servicetec and Harita Techserv. In addition, Gopal has successfully exited several businesses including TVS Whirlpool, TVS Contract Manufacturing, Harita Networks

Harish Bijoor is a Brand domain specialist operating out of Bangalore. He runs a unique boutique consulting outfit branded Harish Bijoor Consults Inc., a brand name that has a consulting presence across the markets of Hong Kong, Seattle, London , Dubai and the Indian sub-continent.He has spent his Corporate career in the realm of FMCG and Telecom.He has spent the last eight years prior to his Telecom stint with Tata Coffee Limited in various designations moving through the Brand Management and Marketing Hierarchy.Harish spent the first eight years of his career with Hindustan Unilever Limited moving through the Sales and Distribution stream during the first four years and the Brand Management stream in the next four.

Harish is actively involved in the world of coffee in India. He is a member of many active coffee forums and delivers lectures on the subject in India and Internationally. He is a member of the Coffee Board of India under the auspices of the Union Ministry of Commerce.Harish has recently published a book titled, “Marketing Trends – Smart Insights into the world of Indian Business” ….. a serious book written in a style that is distinctly young and MTV-ish! He is currently involved in his second book on core-branding.

Harish is an active member of the Plantations sub-committee of the Planning Commission for the formulation of the XIth Five year Plan(2007-12).
Harish is a member on the Board of Directors of a clutch of companies and his passion lies in the arena of good Corporate Governance.Harish teaches at the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad (Ranked No. 20 among Global Business schools by Financial Times, London) and is a much sought-after public speaker. He has a total of 8617 hours of Public speaking  and Training experience among Corporate organizations across the world.

Jose, or JTR as he’s fondly known, has played a large role in enhancing the equity of the brand ‘Orange County’. In addition to winning ‘Asia’s Responsible Tourism Award’ and two other prestigious awards at the World Travel Awards 2009, London, Orange County and their marketing team can rightfully claim credit for turning hitherto unknown Coorg into an international tourism destination. With over ten years of experience in marketing luxury resorts in the domestic and international markets, he strongly believes that the key to growth lies in building brands with a strong equity. Besides ideating and implementing new, innovative marketing ideas like ‘Lifescapes’ (Currently nominated for the ‘World’s Leading Digital Online Marketing Campaign’ by World Travel Awards 2010), he has not shied away from revisiting established brand stratagems. Jose firmly believes that every brand must influence the ecosystem it operates in, and here he has been able to integrate an environmental and cultural conscience within the Group’s business philosophy by spearheading Orange County’s robust Responsible Tourism policies.

Jose is a devoted family man, and his evenings are devoted to his wife and three children.
Besides being a keen collector of South Indian art and antiques, he enjoys a round of badminton or two, plays the guitar with panache, sings tenor in a western classical choir and boasts an eclectic collection of music ranging from Carnatic/Hindustani to Contemporary Jazz/ classic rock. He is also closely involved with the Church and various charitable causes

KP is a co-founder and Managing Director with Sequoia Capital in India, where he focuses on both venture and later stage investments.  Sequoia is a global leader in venture capital and growth equity investments, and invests across high growth sectors such as consumer services, financial services, IT, mobile, healthcare and infrastructure services. KP received an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BS in Business Management from Brigham Young University Hawaii. He is based in Bangalore.  KP grew up in Chennai and is a former top ranked national level tennis player.

Manohar Atreya heads investment banking for the tech/BPO sector at o3 Capital. He has more than 15 years of experience in the Tech sector in M&A, strategy, sales and operations. He has interacted and worked extensively with CXO’s and senior management of Fortune 2000 corporations, a multitude of entrepreneurs, and a host of midsized companies. He is a specialist in M&A and fund raising, and actively tracks the Indian tech industry. He has been dealmaker in multiple M&A transactions in the recent past, including aerospace engineering, financial services, IT services and product development.

Meena Ganesh is the CEO of Manipal K-12 Education, which is a joint venture between TutorVista.com and Manipal Education and Medical Group. TutorVista through its global business provides Supplemental education services for international markets using its proprietary technology platform and the services of teachers from India. The solutions offered by Manipal K-12 Education include ICT based solutions to enhance the teaching learning process in the domestic education sector in India. These solutions come from the 10 year old group company Edurite Technologies. Under her leadership, Manipal K-12 Education has entered into the space of school management and supplementary education.

Prior to this, Meena was the CEO of Tesco’s operations in India, the Tesco Hindustan Service Center. The Tesco HSC is the core IT and back office support organization for the entire global operations of the business.

Before coming on board Tesco‚ Meena co-founded one of India's pioneering BPO companies; CustomerAsset which she sold to ICICI OneSource. She was the Chief Operations Officer of CustomerAsset and helped build the organization to nearly 4000 people‚ servicing large corporate customers in UK and US markets.

During her five-year association with Microsoft India‚ she set up multiple business units for them‚ including Microsoft Consulting‚ Internet and Application Development/Business services units. She was with
PricewaterhouseCoopers and with NIIT during the initial 11 years of her career.

This PGDM holder from IIM Calcutta has a graduate degree in Physics from the Madras University..

Nainesh Jaisingh, Managing Director, SCPE, is a Partner with Standard Chartered’s Asian Private Equity business, and has been with the business since 2000.

In 2001, he co-founded Fin Ventures, a global Venture Capital Fund sponsored by Standard Chartered Bank, headquartered at Singapore. In 2003, Nainesh was instrumental in the launch of the Merlion India Fund, a JV between SCPE and Temasek, Singapore.

With SCPE, Nainesh has made and managed successful investments in several sectors - Software/BPO, Engineering, Pharmaceuticals, Shipbuilding, Auto Components, Power Generation, Travel, and Financial Services. He serves on the Board of Directors of several companies.

Nainesh is an Engineer with an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.

Pranav was one of the first few people to start Austin based Trilogy's India operations in 2000 and was instrumental in scaling Trilogy over next 7 years by taking on challenging leadership assignments to grow its operations in India and China. As a “Section Lead” in Trilogy University 2004, Pranav kickstarted 4 new businesses for Trilogy in a span of 3 months.

He then left Trilogy to start Lifeblob, a social photo sharing service that helps build connections between people through photos. Lifeblob currently hosts over 3 million photos and has a thriving community where amateur photographers improve their skills by interacting with experts. Pranav was recently named in Business Week's list of  Asia's Top 25 Entrepreneurs for the year 2009.

Raja is among the earliest leaders of the Private Equity asset class in India. Raja founded Ascent Capital in association with UTI Ventures. Over the past ten years, he has recruited and nurtured a winning team, played a crucial role in all of the firm’s investments, and has forged significant LP relationships. Raja has a passion for supporting entrepreneurs and has worked closely with the teams of some of the most successful PE-backed companies in India.

Previously, Raja has served in various capacities such as Research Fellow at Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Officer of the Indian Civil Services, Regional Manager of Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), India’s capital markets regulator and Executive Director of UTI Mutual Fund. During his association with SEBI, he oversaw the launch of several IPOs, regulated market intermediaries and also as member of Advisory Committee. He has also served as a director of five Indian stock exchanges and on the boards of several private and publicly listed companies.

Raja holds M.Sc. and M. Phil in Science, and is a graduate of AMP of the Harvard Business School.

Raja is an Advisory Board member of Next Wealth (fostering social entrepreneurship), and a charter Member of TiE. Raja is also a budding golfer

Dr. Rajeev Gowda is Chairperson, Centre for Public Policy and Professor of Economics and Social Sciences at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore. His education includes an MA in Economics from Fordham University and a PhD in Public Policy and Management from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. He has worked as a Post-doctoral Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, and as Associate Professor at the University of Oklahoma.

Professor Gowda´s research focuses on how people and societies manage risk. His edited books include “Judgments, Decisions, and Public Policy,” published by Cambridge University Press.

After his return to India Professor Gowda is actively immersed in politics and is with the Congress party. He draws on his political “field work” for his publications on the Indian political process.

Professor Gowda is now building the Resurgent India Trust that aims to empower youth and energize Bangalore. An avid quizzer, Dr. Gowda was national runner-up on BBC TV’s Mastermind India in 2001.

Kanwal Singh is a co-founder of Helion and has over 20 years of experience in the areas of venture investing, marketing and business development across multiple sectors in India. In addition to his role at Helion, he serves on the boards of Jigrahak Mobility, Hurix Systems, Amba Research and Humming Bird Suites.

Prior to Helion, Kanwal spent four years as a director and co-head of The Carlyle Group’s India venture operations. At Carlyle, he helped define the strategy for Carlyle India, invested in over half a dozen companies and worked closely with the portfolio companies to help them accelerate their business. Before this, Kanwal worked for over 13 years in the marketing and business development functions of Intel Corporation and Hindustan Unilever India. As Head of Marketing for Intel South Asia, he spent about three years building the Intel brand in India which included corporate branding, channel and OEM marketing and PR. Kanwal joined Intel from Hindustan Unilever, a subsidiary of Unilever, where he spent over 10 years in various jobs including sales, brand management and product innovation.

He has a Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Punjab University and an MBA in marketing and finance from the Faculty of Management Studies, New Delhi.

Sunil Maheshwari is the CEO and Co-Founder at Mango Technologies Pvt. Ltd. Sunil has diverse experience in working with global and start-up companies in Mobile handset and distributed framework in Media Software domain.
Sunil has seen the complete life cycle of a technology software product, where he conceived the idea with other co-Founder and successfully sold  it to global technology company Qualcomm, Inc. This is the fourth time he is working in a start-up product creation environment now.
He has worked on several releases for mobile handset software and complete handset releases for global customers. Sunil has not only successfully handled customer/partnership building with companies like Qualcomm, TI, NXP, Samsung, Motorola Haier, and Virgin Mobile but has also conceptualized new business and technical ideas in Terminal Device Software and mobile application domain.
Sunil is playing a key leadership role at Mango. In a very short span of Mango Technologies, company is working with the top notch companies of the world and also noticed by the prominent organizations at a very early stage e.g., MINT-Wall Street Journal mentioned about Mango in “Top Ten Startup Companies of 2008″, NASSCOM has given Innovation Award in Market Facing Innovations, Most innovative product in South Asia by Manthan, GSMA has chosen Mango as the Top Innovator nominees and Business world as top 5 promising entrepreneurs in India.

Having completed her B.A., LL.B (Hons) from National Law School of India University, Bangalore and LL.M from the London School of Economics & Political Science (LSE), Reeba Chacko  is a partner of Amarchand Mangaldas, presently at the Bangalore office, and has been with the Firm since 1999 (starting her career at the Delhi office of the Firm). Reeba specializes in private equity/ venture capital investments, and mergers/ takeovers/acquisitions, and focuses primarily on the Firm’s South practice.

Reeba has been involved in various types of transactions in her practice area including structured investments, PIPEs, joint ventures and strategic partnerships, inbound as well as outbound acquisitions, corporate restructuring, entry strategies in restricted sectors such as retail, defence, structuring complicated quasi equity and debt investment structures across various sectors and is also an expert in foreign investment laws particularly in some key sectors like retail, real estate, education and defence . 

Being known as a leading private equity and venture capital investments lawyer, she advises several domestic as well as foreign funds on their India investments besides assisting several start ups and growth stage companies as well as public listed companies in receiving financial and strategic investments. As part of her wide ranging transactional and advisory experience, Reeba also closely interacts with government departments and other regulatory authorities including the Foreign Investment Promotion Board and the Reserve Bank of India

Sanjay Nayak is the Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer of Tejas Networks, a leading optical networking product company from India. Mr. Nayak is a technologist with over 20 years of industry experience in India as well as the USA. Prior to founding Tejas, he held senior management position in globally leading Electronic Design Automation companies such as Synopsys (where he was the Managing Director of Synopsys-India) and earlier at Cadence Design Systems.

Mr. Nayak holds a M.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from North Carolina State University, Raleigh and B.E in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra.

Sean Blagsvedt is the CEO of Babajob.com, which connects employers to informal sector employees in the developing world  - such as maids, cooks and office helpers  - through a combination of mobile phones, location, skill and price filtering and social connections. The site has added over 100,000 users and 300,000 job positions, launched with 3 large mobile carriers in India and has been profiled by the New York Times as a significant innovation that “seeks to bring the social-networking revolution to the world’s poor.”
Previously, Sean spent 9 years with Microsoft in the Office, Windows and Research groups. In 2004, Sean moved to Bangalore as the 3rd member of Microsoft Research India, heading the Program Management and Advanced Prototyping team, focusing on novel approaches to mobile phones and technology in emerging markets.
Prior to Microsoft, Sean worked at the White House with the Internet Policy czar, Ira Magaziner.  Sean is also a Founding Member of the NASSCOM Sub-Committee for Technology for the Base of the Pyramid. Sean holds dual bachelor degrees in Computer Science and Public Policy from Brown University (1998) and is a TED India 2009 Fellow.

Shruti Shibulal is young Entrepreneur and Director of Avant Garde Hospitality. She is a food enthusiast at heart and loves to dine at restaurants all over the world. Before becoming an entrepreneur, Shruti’s interests and experiences ranged from good food, company of friends and live music to experimenting in chemistry lab and working in an investment bank on Wall Street. As a director in AGH she plays a supporting role to Abhijit Saha in important company matters while learning about the various aspects of the restaurant business. Her interests, interpersonal and analytical skills, and belief in the company’s vision and philosophy allow her to help drive AGH to be one of the best hospitality companies.

She cares a great deal about contributing back to the community at large, an ideal that with which Avant Garde Hospitality is in tandem with. Shruti believes that education among the underprivileged is the key to uplifting society and as such she is currently serving as a Trustee and Member of the Management Council for The Samhita Academy on Bannerghata Road, Bangalore

Srikanth manages client delivery and also leads the initiatives on the technology, internet & ITES sectors. He has over twelve years of well rounded experience in investment banking, private equity and corporate planning. He has advised & assisted many companies in their funding plans and M&A. He has also invested in companies, been on their boards, taken part in their growth strategies and successfully raised funds/acquired businesses for growth.

Earlier, Srikanth was with Ernst & Young, leading the private equity and M&A activities in the technology & services sectors. Prior to that, he was with ICICI Venture, the private equity arm of ICICI Bank (listed on NYSE), investing and managing a portfolio of investments in the IT / ITES sectors. He was also with RelQ Software, the leading software testing services firm in India, managing their corporate planning activities including acquiring a couple of businesses in Europe and raising a round of funding (both equity and debt) for the same. He has corporate experience as well, having worked with companies like TATA Motors and TATA Technologies.

Srikanth is an MBA from IIM Bangalore and holds an Engineering degree from BITS Pilani.

Srini Rajam joined Texas Instruments India in 1985, as a Software Engineer. He has held many technical and leadership roles in TI, spanning the areas of Design Automation, ASIC and DSP product development. During 1993-94, Srini Rajam worked in the Asia Pacific Region as Technical Marketing Director for TI's Semiconductor Products in Asia. In that role, he set up the Customer Application Centers for TI products in Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei and Seoul. During this time, he also functioned as the Chairman of TI's Technical Council in Asia.

Srini was the Managing director of Texas Instruments India during 1995-2000. 
He was a member of the TI Corporate Steering Team for TI India and the TI Asia Leadership Team. He was also the Chairman of TI Asia advisory team for the regional technical council. Srini served as a member of the Governing Council of the Department of Electronics' Software Technology Parks during the period 1996-98. He is currently a member of the Karnataka State IT Task Force formed by the Chief Minister. He is the Chairman of Indo American Chamber of Commerce, Karnataka Branch for the year 2000-01.

Srini has a Master's Degree in Computer Science from the School of Automation, Indian Institute of Science, 1984 and a Bachelor's Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Madurai University, 1982.

Mr Sudhir Sethi is Founder, Chairman & Managing Director of IDG Ventures India, a US$150 Million early-stage technology venture capital fund backed by IDG, the world’s largest IT-focused media company.  Sudhir founded IDG Ventures in 2006 after 26 years in the technology and venture industry. IDG Ventures India invests across the country in all areas of technology and technology enabled services.

Prior to joining IDG Ventures India, Sudhir served as a President and Executive Director of Infotech Enterprises, India’s premier design engineering and GIS services leader. Previously, he was a General Partner for Walden International for four years where he was responsible for leading their venture capital operations in India.  Sudhir served the IT industry for twelve years as a senior executive at Wipro and five years at HCL, both leading global IT service firms.

In 2001, Sudhir was recognized by Red Herring as one of the leading venture capitalists in the country. He has been named among the Top Ten IT Professional by Dataquest. Sudhir also served on the Investment Committee of UTI Ventures for four years, on Advisory Board of Westbridge Capital (now Sequoia Capital) and on the Board of Advisors at N. S. Raghavan Center for Entrepreneurship, IIM Bangalore. Sudhir was the seed investor in Mindtree Consulting and served on the Board for 4 years. He has also served on the Board of Directors at Infotech Enterprises, Venture Infotek, Jobstreet, Webvision and Webdunia.  Mr Sethi today serves on the Boards of Manthan Systems, ConnectM, iViZ Techno Solutions, 3D Solid Compression, Perfint, Aujas Networks, Myntra and US IVCA (India Venture Capital Association) as well as Emploi Globale Consulting.

Sukanto Aich is a Senior Executive with a proven track record of building successful businesses, delivering rapid revenue growth and creating operational structures to sustain growth and profitability. In his current capacity as Director for BCCL Private Treaties, Sukanto leads a group of professionals who works with their portfolio clients to enhance Enterprise Value.

In his previous assignment Sukanto was the COO for the Enterprise Services business of Bharti Airtel for its South Hub operations managing revenues in excess of Rs. 1000 crores and working closely with leading corporate clients in the IT and ITES space.

Sukanto has done his MBA from IIM Calcutta and has worked closely with the senior management teams in leading Indian organisations like Bharti Airtel and HCL Group.

He likes reading and travelling. One of his recent memorable trips was to Egypt and he is currently working on a biography of Barrack Obama, the president of USA

Suresh is Executive Director at TVS Capital Funds Limited, which manages an India focused growth private equity fund. Suresh has been instrumental in structuring, fund raising and launching of the TVS Shriram Growth Fund, and is responsible for investments from the fund. Prior to joining the fund, Suresh worked at Deutsche Bank's technology investment banking practice in Boston. Suresh has several years of transactional experience that ranges from private equity, M&A to equity/debt financing transactions. Suresh has executed over 25 advisory and capital raising transactions, primarily targeting mid-cap companies in US. In addition, Suresh spent several years in an operational role with experience across project management, product development, sales &; marketing. Suresh also worked closely with the management team of Yasu Technologies, a privately held software company based out of Hyderabad that was acquired by SAP. Suresh earned a B.Tech from IIT Madras, an MS from The Ohio State University and an MBA from University of Chicago.

Umesh Malhotra started his career in 1990 with Infosys Technologies (NASDAQ: Infy). He spent more than 9 years at the company and was a business manager at the company. He handled 5% of the company’s revenues and had client relationships across the globe. In 1999, he moved on to become an entrepreneur and co-founded Bangalore Labs, a pioneer in the IT infrastructure management space. Bangalore Labs set up the first NOC in India catering to international market and boasted of clients like General Motors, Fosters, Levers and Reliance across geographies like North America, Australia and India. In 2002, the company was acquired by Planet-one Asia Pte Ltd to complement its service delivery capability across the world.

His interest for reading and children led to setting up of Hippocampus in 2003 that promotes reading amongst children. Hippocampus started with a children’s experience centre in Koramangala, Bangalore and is creating the platform to develop the reading habit amongst children. Hippocampus also works with many NGOs in Bangalore to setup libraries in government schools and NGO run schools. Hippocampus today works with more than 165 libraries in 2 states catering to nearly 70,000 children. In 2008, Umesh was selected an Ashoka Fellow for his work at Hippocampus. Ashoka is the world's largest group of Social Entrepreneurs and boasts of less than 3000 fellows across 60 countries.

Umesh is also a restaurateur and runs the popular chain of restaurants called Oye Amritsar. Umesh is a graduate from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras and serves on the boards of fast growing new age companies

Dr. Villoo Morawala-Patell is Founder, Chairperson and Managing Director of AVESTHAGEN LIMITED. AVESTHAGEN is globally recognized as a leading systems biology company with a unique model focused on the convergence of food, pharma and population geneticsTM. A convergence that leads to continuous and path-breaking innovations in predictive, preventive, personalized healthcareTM.

Owing to her pioneering work in the field of molecular biology, Dr. Patell has long-standing professional relationships with individuals, institutions and corporates working in the domain of biotechnology across the world. She is a key member of the Task Force and Vision Group for Biotechnology, instituted by the State Government of Karnataka and founding member of the Association of Biotechnology Led Enterprises (ABLE). Dr. Patell has been Awarded the 'Officer of the National Order of Merit' by the President of the French Republic in April 2008, received prestigious ‘Karmaveer Puraskar’ as a ‘Corporate Citizen’ for her contribution in the field of agriculture and healthcare in Nov 2009 by iCONGO (Indian Confederation of NGOs) & Karmaveer Puraskar is a National Award for Social Justice & Citizen Action, the Adolfo Ibanez University Award for her achievements in innovation and creation of value,  Outstanding Zarathushti Entrepreneur Award from World Zarathushti Chamber of Commerce 2009, Kerana Tuhan Untuk Manusia, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Parsi Entrepreneur par Excellence by the Mumbai Parsi Punchayet, Parsi Entrepreneur Par Excellence Award from Bombay Parsi Panchayat in May 2008, Astitva Award for Excellence in Science and Technology presented by the Zee-Archana Astitva Awards,  the BioSpectrum Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2006, Outstanding Woman Entrepreneur for the year 2005-2006 from Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI), The Ojaswini Udyamita Alankaran Award 2004.

Yusuf Motiwala is the founder and CEO. He brings 14 years of data & telecom design experience to TringMe. Prior to founding TringMe in 2007, he held key architecture and management position at Aricent (then HSS), Lucent Technologies, Texas Instruments etc. He received various awards for recognition of his technical contribution at Lucent & Texas Instrument including prestigious MGTS by TI president & Best-in-class award at TI.
Yusuf has filed multiple patents in the area of IPTV and telecommunication. He is also an author of few IEEE/ACM papers and got special mention in RFC 4067 for his contribution to wireless context transfer.
He holds Masters Degree in EE from IIT, Bombay. He was also served as research engineer at Stanford University, Palo Alto for a Bell labs research project..
 

Arjun is a partner in Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A. Shroff & Co. and has been with the firm since 2001. He heads the firm’s Technology Law practice and advises his clients which range from start ups to leading listed technology companies through various stages in their life cycle.

He advises technology companies ranging from startups to leading listed companies including Google and Amazon on their core information technology operations. This includes structuring and negotiating outsourcing transactions, technology transfer and licensing transactions, software and hardware development contracts and advising on the Indian regulatory framework surrounding internet service provider liability, GPS mapping and navigation, transcoding, VoIP and other technologies to clients. The Firm’s Technology Law practice is been ranked as a Tier 1 practice in India by Chambers and Partners, UK in 2009. 

He also advises technology companies through their core corporate life cycle ranging from structuring entry strategies and early stage operations to early, middle and late stage funding. As a co-head of the Firm’s Securities Law group, he advises technology companies on domestic and international exit and fund raising transactions by way of capital markets issuances including IPOs, ADR, GDR, FCCB and QIP issuances for clients including Infosys Technologies, OnMobile Global, MindTree Consulting and Opto Circuits. The Firm’s capital markets practice was also rated as a Tier I practice in India by Chambers and Partners, UK in 2009.

Raj is a Senior Managing Director at Fidelity Growth Partners India. Raj has over ten years of leadership experience in the Indian private equity industry, with experience of investing across multiple stages and industries. During his private equity career, Raj has also worked in The Carlyle Group and Merlion (Temasek-Standard Chartered JV) and was earlier the co-founder and Managing Director of WestBridge Capital Partners (now Sequoia India).

Raj started his career as a management consultant with Booz Allen & Hamilton where he worked both in USA and India. He subsequently worked as an investment banker for Goldman Sachs where he was responsible for India coverage and served on the board of Goldman’s then JV partner Kotak Mahindra Capital.

Raj holds an AB degree from Dartmouth College and an MBA degree from MIT Sloan School of Management. He is a charter member of TiE and a member of the Young Presidents’ Organisation (YPO).

Mr. Jayesh Bhargava is Senior Vice President at HSBC Securities Services in Mumbai. He heads the sales team of Corporate Trustee and Loan Agency business in India which comprises of escrow services, Bankers to Issues and Trustee products. He has a rich experience in the banking and financial services industry for more than 15 years. He was working with the Deutsche Bank Corporate Banking division in the German Mid Bank segment prior to his role with HSBC.

He is a Chartered Accountant and a Cost Accountant by profession.

Alok Mittal is one of the early success stories of the web as he was
the Co-Founder of JobsAhead which was later sold to Monster.com. Alok
Mittal joined Canaan (a venture capital firm) in March 2006 to lead
the firm’s India operations. In India, Alok focuses on investments in
digital media and mobile companies, as well as innovators in managed
software services.

Alok was also a founding member of Indian Angel Network (formerly,
Band of Angels India). Alok has played a key role in Canaan’s
investments in BharatMatrimony, iYogi, and Cellcast.

Jacob joined New Silk Route Advisors in April 2007 and focuses on
private equity opportunities in the Indian sub-continent out of the
Bangalore office. Prior to joining NSR, Jacob was one of the Partners of the India
Consumer Growth Fund.
 
In mid 2000, Jacob was named COO and SVP of Tanishq, a fine jewelry
business.  During this period, Jacob was also the Chief Strategy Officer of Titan
Industries, served on the Tata Group Strategy Forum and as a Mentor
CEO to various group companies. In 1996, Jacob became Chief Marketing Officer of the watch business at Titan. Under his stewardship, a widely respected
annual poll ranked the Titan brand as India’s top consumer brand in
2000. In 1993, Jacob joined Titan Industries to lead a pioneering attempt to
take an Indian consumer brand into international markets.

Jacob has a degree in engineering (B.E. EEE) from the National
Institute of Technology, Tiruchirapalli and an MBA from XLRI,
Jamshedpur. He received the Distinguished Alumni Award from NITT in 2008.

Rahul formed our India investment advisory, Clearstone Venture Advisors, in 2005. Based in Mumbai, he is responsible for identifying early stage companies that will capitalize on the growth in domestic consumer services including wireless, media, entertainment, retail, travel and finance. Having recently relocated to India from Silicon Valley, he has leveraged his cross-border operating experience and industry relationships to lay the foundation for our investments in India.

Prior to joining Clearstone, Rahul was Area Director Asia-Pacific at Sonim Technologies, a wireless start-up in San Mateo. Having joined Sonim during its inception, he was responsible for the company's global marketing and sales initiatives including key markets like China and India. Before Sonim Technologies, he managed strategic alliances and partnerships at Airflash, a location based services provider that was acquired by the location based services market leader Webraska in 2001.

Prior to moving to the US, Rahul helped launch India's first mobile operator 'Orange', a subsidiary of Hutchison Telecom. During his time at Orange in the mid-nineties, he served in several marketing management functions at Orange including leading the team responsible for customer acquisition and retention programs in India as well as developing entry and growth strategies for Orange in Singapore and Israel.

Rahul earned an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School at Northwestern University in Illinois.
 

Dr. Sridhar Mitta, aged 63 years, is the Managing Director and Founder of NextWealth Entrepreneurs Private Limited, Bangalore, India, which promotes Social Entrepreneurship. NextWealth identifies business opportunities with a social intent and helps entrepreneurs to build commercial ventures by providing them with angel funding, mentoring, incubation etc. NextWealth is currently setting up multiple Rural Centers to create 10,000 jobs for rural graduates reversing the trend of their migration to cities. The business model provides value to rural graduates, customers and NextWealth.

Dr. Mitta is also the Managing Director of e4e India. e4e India is part of e4e Inc. whose vision is to add business value to its customers through technology services. Today, e4e is a global company with annual revenues of over US$ 80 millions.

Dr. Mitta was the First Employee at Wipro Limited Information Technology business since its inception in 1980 and played key role in Wipro achieving technology leadership.  As its Chief Technology Officer and President of 'Wipro's Global R&D', he spearheaded strategies which transformed the captive R&D unit into a profitable business.  He pioneered global delivery of outsourced product development services to technology companies like Intel, Cisco Systems, Tandem Computers etc. Wipro became the highest valued company in India during his tenure.    Wipro R&D received 'Award of Excellence in Electronics' from Government of India for five years in a row. Wipro earned coveted CMM Level V software quality certification under his leadership.

Dr. Mitta was also the Founder and CEO of  EnThink  Inc. , an   Intellectual  Property design and licensing  start-up located in silicon valley. He began his career with Electronics Corporation of India, Ltd, Hyderabad.

Dr. Mitta is very passionate about promoting entrepreneurship as entrepreneurs create wealth disproportionate to available resources by taking calculated risks. He is associated with  ‘The IndUs Entrepreneurs (TiE)’ which fosters entrepreneurship globally, for over a decade. He was President of TiE Bangalore Chapter for over four years and was elected to Board of Trustees of TiE Global. He is also advisor to several venture capital organizations including IDG Ventures, Inventus and Kitven.  He mentors many young companies.

Dr. Mitta serves in several Boards of companies located in the United States and India, including e4e Inc., TVS Capital and TVS Electronics.

Dr. Mitta holds a PhD and MS from Oklahoma State University , US ;He has been inducted into CEAT Hall of Fame Oklahoma State University; an M Tech  from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur; and an undergraduate degree in Electronics  and Communication Engineering from Andhra University. He is Fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering.     

Samir has been an early stage venture investor in India for the past six years.   Prior to co-founding Inventus, Samir built and led the India venture team for Acer Technology Ventures - a $260 million cross-border venture fund investing in early-stage technology and services companies across India, the U.S. and the Asia Pacific.   Samir has financed a number of successful Indian and Indo-US companies resulting in three profitable acquisitions to date including his 2006 co-investment in Kaboodle's initial round with John and Kanwal.

Prior to his venture career, Samir was an early member of two startups in India, and was part of the early team at Wipro.   He helped Wipro grow revenues from ~$4M in 1989 to over $200 million in 1998.   Samir has a well established presence in India’s entrepreneurial and venture communities and a broad network of business contacts throughout India and the Asia Pacific region.   As a member of the Leadership Committee of Tie Bangalore, he spearheads the entrepreneur mentoring initiative, which has helped mentor hundreds of entrepreneurs building new companies.   He also guides teams forming companies in the IIT incubators.   Samir was an early member of the India Semiconductor Association’s Executive Council, helping to forge global industry relationships for India’s high growth embedded software and semiconductor industries, particularly in the Greater China region.

Before joining Accel Partners in 2008, Subrata was a Partner at Erasmic Venture Fund. At Accel he focuses on Technology, Mobile & Internet. Subrata has served on the Boards of Small-device (now a part of Digital Chocolate, Mu Sigma, Perfint, Chakpak, Flipkart and enStage. Prior to Erasmic, Subrata was MD, India, for Tavant Technologies, Inc., a US based Mortgage Solutions Company, which was acquired by privately held Ameriquest Mortgage Capital in 2004 (Ameriquest has since merged into CitiCapital). Previously, Subrata was the Founder at Firewhite, Inc., which was acquired by Ubiquio, Inc., and later merged into Mobile Planet. Subrata started his career at IBM's prestigious T.J. Watson and Santa Teresa Labs, working in the Software R&D groups. Subrata holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Delaware, and a B.Tech. in Computer Science from IIT, Kanpur.