Keynotes and Fireside Chats

Arvind Krishna
Arvind Krishna is the Chairman and CEO of IBM. As a business leader and technologist, he has led the development of new markets for IBM in artificial intelligence, cloud, quantum computing, and blockchain. He also drove the successful $34B acquisition of Red Hat that has defined the hybrid cloud market. ​
Deepak Bagla
Deepak Bagla boasts a three-decade career with the World Bank, Citibank, and Private Equity, spanning responsibilities across Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. Appointed Managing Director and CEO of Invest India in 2015, he led the agency to become the world's most awarded Investment Promotion Agency. Under his eight-year tenure, Invest India became a key reference for investors, supporting government initiatives like Startup India and digitizing processes for investment approvals. Prior, he raised India's first global private equity fund dedicated to PPP projects, totaling close to $1 billion.
Chandrika Tandon
Chandrika Tandon is a business leader, Grammy-nominated artist, and humanitarian, committed to emotional and economic empowerment.  She is a former partner of McKinsey & Company, founder and chair of Tandon Capital Associates. She is a Trustee of NYU, NYU Tandon School of Engineering Board Chair, and on the Board of NYU Langone and NYU Stern. 
 
Ms. Tandon has five albums to her credit, has performed on world stages, and received numerous awards for her artistic contributions, including from The Town Hall.  She has also been profiled in print, radio, and television for CNBC's The Brave Ones.  She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a New York Academy of Sciences Governor. 
 
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Frank D'Souza
Frank D’Souza is the co-founder and managing partner of Recognize, a technology investment platform. Prior to Recognize, Frank co-founded and served as CEO of Cognizant Technology Solutions, a global multinational technology services company. ​
Ananth Narayanan
​Ananth Narayanan is the founder & CEO of Mensa Brands – India’s largest D2C house of brands with the vision to build tech-led brands from India for the globe. Within 6 months of operation, Mensa became Asia’s fastest unicorn. Mensa has 25 brands across Fashion, Home, Beauty & FMCG and achieved a net revenue run  rate of $200m while being profitable within a year.
Dr. Ram Madhav
Dr. Ram Madhav is an Indian politician, social leader, author and thinker. He is the President of India Foundation (IF), a New Delhi-based Think tank. In over a decade of India Foundation’s existence, he has been the curator of major annual global and national multilateral initiatives. ​
Amit Verma

Amit Verma, with over 28 years at State Bank of India (SBI), now serves as the Country Head of US Operations. Starting as a Probationary Officer in 1995, he gained extensive experience in Corporate Credit, Human Resources, and Retail Banking.
​Certified by the Indian Institute of Banking & Finance, he held key roles in Mumbai, overseeing Corporate Credit branches, and later managed business development for nearly 500 domestic branches. His recent role as Regional Head - East Asia involved supervising SBI's operations in China, Hong Kong, Japan, and South Korea, concluding in his move to New York in December 2023.