Mukesh Ambani at the India Economic Summit 2007

Mukesh Ambani (born on April 19, 1957 in Aden, Yemen) is an Indian engineer and businessman. He is the chairman, managing director and the largest shareholder of Reliance Industries, India’s largest private sector enterprise and a Fortune 500 company, which he got funded by purchasing large standby letters of credit, which were monetized by several Swiss banks which afforded him guaranteed loans for the purchase. His personal stake in Reliance Industries is 48%. His wealth is valued at $ 32 Billion by Forbes, making him India’s wealthiest person. Mukesh and his younger brother Anil are sons of the late founder of Reliance Industries, Dhirubhai Ambani. Anil Ambani is also a billionaire and owns another company – Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group. Mukesh also owns the Indian Premier League team Mumbai Indians.

Awards & Achievements

• Chosen the businessman of the year 2007 by a public poll in India conducted by NDTV
• Conferred the United States-India Business Council (USIBC) leadership award for “Global Vision” 2007 in Washington.
• Ranked 42nd among the World’s Most Respected Business Leaders and second among the four Indian CEOs featured in a survey conducted by Pricewaterhouse Coopers and published in Financial Times, London, November 2004.
• Conferred the World Communication Award for the Most Influential Person in Telecommunications in 2004 by Total Telecom, October, 2004.
• Chosen Telecom Man of the Year 2004 by Voice and Data magazine, September 2004.
• Ranked 13th in Asia’s Power 25 list of The Most Powerful.
• Recorded as the first Trillionaire in India, June 2007.
• Awarded the “Chitralekha Person of the Year Award — 2007″ by Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
• Former Chairman of IIM-B
  Honorary Fellow of IChemE (the Institution of Chemical Engineers)

Source: Mukesh Ambani, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mukesh_Ambani&oldid=335431983 (last visited Jan. 4, 2010)

Pravina Raghavan says businesses should use more of the SBA's resources

As the U.S. Small Business Administration’s newest district director for New York City, Pravina Raghavan, 38, needs to hit the ground running. Big Apple entrepreneurs are struggling for capital and customers—and business starts fell 14% in the third quarter from the year-earlier period. As part of the federal stimulus package, the SBA dropped its application fees in February and increased its guarantee on many loans to 90%. The agency says those initiatives have supported $11.3 billion in lending since March, but with both provisions slated to end this year, many small businesses are waiting for Plan B.

Q: What do you think is the biggest problem facing small businesses today?

A: People should be using a lot more of the resources that are available to them. There’s a lot of money out there. The question is whether you’re looking for the right funding for your business, and sometimes it takes some creativity and ingenuity to figure that out. I also think communities need to get behind their businesses. We’re a big organization; it’s tough for us to go to every small business in every community.

Q: Are there any challenges unique to New York City?

A: We have diversity here that I think is a blessing but can sometimes be an obstacle. It’s a challenge when you have to go and help communities that don’t normally reach out to government, or don’t know what the SBA does because the government [in their native country] didn’t have that.

Q: What do you think the SBA is doing wrong?

A: Getting out what we do. People need to know that the SBA is out there and ready to help, and is a resource, not just some amorphous agency.

Q: What has the SBA done right?

A: The ability to increase the loan guarantee to 90% and cut fees is amazing. Those two elements have really helped banks open up. We’re incentivizing the banks and essentially asking them, ‘How can you turn away loans?’

Q: Are there any plans to extend the stimulus initiatives?

A: They are expected to end soon, but we’re hoping that with their success so far, those programs will continue. Right now we’re in a holding pattern until we get new goals and everybody reviews the success of the program. It may continue, it may not; we’re not sure yet.

Q: Your most recent job was at MTV as a vice president in marketing. Why the switch from MTV?

A: The rest of my background probably makes more sense. I’m a former mergers-and-acquisitions director for AT&T in Europe, a former technology investment banker, and for six years I owned my own small business that did advisory for small businesses in Europe. The one thing I figured I’d like to learn more about was marketing and sales, which is why I took the job with MTV.

Q: If you could start your own small business, what would it be?

A: I think I would go back to what I was doing, which was giving advisory services to technology businesses. I enjoyed that because I was helping businesses grow, which is really what I hope to do with the SBA, just on a much larger scale. Instead of helping one business, I can help thousands.

Q: What will you miss about your old job?

A: I’ll miss having access to events. I just watched the Video Music Awards and thought, ‘That was one well-run event. I kind of wish I was there.’

Q: Out of the 15 countries you’ve lived and worked in, which did you love the most?

A: The most interesting place I’ve ever worked has been Russia. The economy is definitely different than anything else I’ve ever approached. But the place I’ve most loved to live is New Jersey; I’m a Jersey girl.

Source: Article in Crain New York Online by Kira Bindrim

Indira Nooyi, PepsiCo CEO, at the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2008

Indra Krishnamurthy Nooyi born October 28, 1955 is the Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of PepsiCo, one of the world’s leading food and beverage companies. On August 14, 2006, Nooyi was named the successor to Steven Reinemund as chief executive officer of the company effective October 1, 2006. On February 5, 2007, she was named Chairperson, effective May 2, 2007.

She is a Successor Fellow of the Yale Corporation.  She is a Class B director of the Board of Directors of the New York Federal Reserve.  She serves as a member of the boards of theInternational Rescue Committee, Catalyst and the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. She is also a member of the Board of Trustees of Eisenhower Fellowships, and currently serves as Chairperson of the U.S.-India Business Council.

Indra Nooyi was born in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. She completed her schooling from Holy Angels AIHSS, Chennai. She received a Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Madras Christian College in 1974 and Post Graduate Diploma in Management from Indian Institute of Management Calcutta. Beginning her career in India, Nooyi held product manager positions at Johnson & Johnson and textile firm Mettur Beardsell. She was admitted to Yale School of Management in 1978 and earned a Master’s degree in Public and Private Management. Graduating in 1980, Nooyi joined the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), and then held strategy positions at Motorola and Asea Brown Boveri.

Nooyi joined PepsiCo in 1994 and was named president and CFO in 2001. Nooyi has directed the company’s global strategy for more than a decade and led PepsiCo’s restructuring, including the 1997 divestiture of its restaurants into Tricon, now known as Yum! Brands. Nooyi also took the lead in the acquisition of Tropicana in 1998, and merger with Quaker Oats Company, which also brought Gatorade to PepsiCo.  In 2007 she became the fifth CEO in PepsiCo’s 44-year history.

Business officials rave at her ability to drive deep and hard while maintaining a sense of heart and fun. According to BusinessWeek, since she started as CFO in 2000, the company’s annual revenues have risen 72%, while net profit more than doubled, to $5.6 billion in 2006.

Nooyi was named on Wall Street Journal‘s list of 50 women to watch in 2007 and 2008, and was listed among Time‘s 100 Most Influential People in The World in 2007 and 2008.  Forbes named her the #3 most powerful woman in 2008.

Forbes magazine ranked Nooyi third on the 2008 and 2009 list of The World’s 100 Most Powerful Women. Fortune magazine has named Nooyi number one on its annual ranking of Most Powerful Women in business for 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009. In 2008, Nooyi was named one of America’s Best Leaders by U.S. News & World Report.

In 2007, she was chosen as a recipient of the Padma Bhushan award by the Government of India.  In 2008, she was elected to the Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

In January 2008, Nooyi was elected Chairman of the US-India Business Council (USIBC), a non-profit business advocacy organization representing more than 300 of the world’s largest companies doing business in India.  Nooyi leads USIBC’s Board of Directors, an assembly of more than 60 senior executives representing a cross-section of American industry.

Indra Nooyi has been named 2009 CEO of the Year by Global Supply Chain Leaders Group.

Source: Indra Nooyi, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Indra_Nooyi&oldid=334609992 (last visited Jan. 4, 2010).

Indian- born Gurbaksh Chahal is one of America's most successful young entrepreneurs

Gurbaksh Singh Chahal (born July 17, 1982) is an American entrepreneur, best-selling author, TV personality, motivational speaker, and self made multi-millionaire. By the age of 25, he founded two advertising companies worth $340 million, more recently appeared on several TV shows and published a memoir.

G, as he is known, was born in the town of Tarn Taran, near Amritsar in Punjab, India to Avtar and Arjinder Chahal. In 1985, his parents received a visa for America through a lottery-based system in India, and the following year, when he was four, the family settled in San Jose, California. His parents had arrived with only $25 to their name, and they struggled at menial jobs to make a future for their four children.

Business Ventures

On December 15, 1998, aged 16, Gurbaksh Chahal dropped out of high school and started his first venture, ClickAgents. ClickAgents was an advertising network focused on performance-based advertising. Two years later, on November 1, 2000, ValueClick announced it agreed to buy ClickAgents in a $22 million all-stock merger. Chahal had a three year non-compete agreement with ValueClick.

In January 12, 2004, Chahal formed BlueLithium another advertising network which was recognized as an innovator in the online advertising space in a Business 2.0 article. In 2006, under Chahal’s leadership, BlueLithium was named Top Innovator by AlwaysOn. On October 15, 2007, Yahoo! bought BlueLithium for $300 million in cash. He remained CEO of the company through the transition period.

In September 2009, Chahal started his third venture, gWallet, a virtual currency platform for social media. He remains the Chairman & CEO of the Company. On December 1, 2009, gWallet raised its first institutional round of financing totaling $12.5 million from Adam Street Partners, Trinity Ventures, Stanford University and various others.

Media Appearances

On October 23, 2008, Chahal appeared on the The Oprah Winfrey Show to discuss his life and business journey. In his interview, Oprah introduced him as “one of the youngest and also the wealthiest entrepreneurs on the planet Earth”. He has appeared on other talk shows such as The Bonnie Hunt Show, The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet, CNBC, Current TV and on Neil Cavuto’s show.

Chahal appeared in the pilot episode of the Fox TV reality show Secret Millionaire, where he went undercover in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco to give away at least $100,000 of his own money.

On January 8, 2009, he was featured on Extra TV as America’s Most Eligible Bachelor. Chahal currently lives in San Francisco, California.

Source: Gurbaksh Chahal, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gurbaksh_Chahal&oldid=335601867 (last visited Jan. 4, 2010).

Usha Chaumar, a gregarious 40-something with an enormous grin, can pinpoint the exact day she stopped being one of the “untouchables,” the Hindu caste that was supposedly abolished in 1950.

It was 2003, and Ms. Chaumar was on her way to work when Bindeshwar Pathak stopped her. She recalls being amazed that a “nicely dressed” man would even speak with someone like her: a manual scavenger. As such, it was her job to clean human waste, by hand, from homes that lack flushing toilets in this dusty town in the state of Rajasthan.

Usually, neighbors crossed the street when they saw her coming with the tools of her trade: a metal pan and wire brush. And even when she had finished her gut-churning work and scrubbed her body clean, she was treated as a pariah.

But Dr. Pathak asked her why she covered her face with her shawl and why she seemed ashamed to talk to him. At the time, Chaumar had no idea she was speaking to the man whose mission it was to end manual scavenging and who would eventually change her life.

Pathak founded an organization called Sulabh in 1970 to eradicate the practice by replacing unplumbed toilets with affordable flush ones, and by giving scavengers training for other jobs.

“Shopkeepers would drop the rice to me – they wouldn’t touch me,” Chaumar remembers, losing her smile for a moment. “And they made me put my money down, away from them. They threw water over it before taking it.”

Today, she earns a living selling homemade pickles and embroidered cloth.

Manual scavenging was banned in India in 1993, by a law that forbids the construction of dry toilets and requires existing ones to be destroyed. But in India, such laws tend to be implemented slowly. There are thought to be several hundred thousand manual scavengers still working; a recent report found there were over 1,000 in Delhi alone.

Sulabh has built 1.2 million affordable hygienic toilets throughout India and helped 60,000 former manual scavengers move into other jobs.

All those jobs are held by members of the Valmiki community, a substratum of the Dalit caste – formerly known as untouchable – at the bottom of the ancient Hindu caste system. The term untouchable – along with, theoretically, the stigma attached to it – was made illegal by India’s Constitution in 1950.

In Alwar, in 2003, Pathak set up a retraining program for the town’s manual scavengers which has given more than 50 women vocational training. The center, where women learn to read and write, make clothes, and train as beauticians, is housed in a prosperous area of Alwar.

“At first they felt uncomfortable coming here, but we wanted to give them a different perspective,” says Suman Chahar, who runs the center.

In one room, Lalita Nanda is making wicks for oil lamps in Hindu temples. The priests who buy them did not let Lalita into the temple until recently, she says, smiling.

One of the first things Pathak did with Alwar’s scavengers was usher them into the town’s biggest Hindu temple. He also took a group out to dinner at the Maurya Sheraton, a five-star hotel in Delhi.

The manager was so appalled he tried to stop the women entering. Pathak promised to pay for anything that was broken or stolen; nothing, of course, was; and as the party left, the manager apologized to them.

Sulabh’s transformation of manual scavengers would not be possible without the other part of its work, the development of cheap hygienic toilet technology.

“The toilet is a tool of social change,” declares Pathak, who defies the stereotype of the scruffy Gandhian activist dressed in rough-spun cotton. He is wearing, instead, a starched white pajama suit with a smart jacket; his hair is dyed black, and he wears a fine gold ring.

Born into a family of Brahmins – the highest of all the castes – in a village in Bihar, Pathak remembers, as a little boy, being intrigued by the notion that the ordinary-looking woman who sold kitchen utensils to his family could be “untouchable.”

“So I touched her,” he says, “Just to see. And my grandmother made me drink a mixture of cow urine, cow dung, and Ganges water.” That combination is meant as both cleanser and punishment.

Later, Pathak joined a committee established to celebrate the centennial of Mahatma Gandhi’s birth. During this period he was struck by what Mr. Gandhi had said about scavengers: “I may not be born again, but if it happens I will like to be born into a family of scavengers, so that I may relieve them of the inhuman, unhealthy, and hateful practice of carrying night soil.”

Curious, Pathak went to live in a community of scavengers for three months. At this point, he says, he was not yet inspired by their cause. But two experiences changed this.

The first, he says, was when he saw a newly married girl being forced by her mother-in-law to clean human waste by hand. “I can’t describe how awful her crying was,” he says. The second was when he saw a small boy being attacked by a bull. People rushed to save him, but when someone cried out that he came from the Valamiki caste, they left him, and he was killed.

“These things still happen,” says Pathak. “But we have everything we need to change things. It is so, so simple, if people only have the will.”

Source: Christian Science Monitor Article by Mian Ridge