Gender issues in Corporate India

Sangeeta Talwar is acclaimed as the first woman in the Consumer products sector in India and has blazed several new trails. In a career spanning over 30 years Mrs. Talwar has worked across large businesses of European, American and Indian corporations. She largely worked with the private sector in India & in Switzerland as well as spearheaded the implementation of a national level, Social sector – World Bank funded project in Rural India. She has multifunctional exposure across the disciplines of Marketing, Sales, Human Resources and General Management and has built familiarity both with urban as well as rural India

Hema Ravichandar is a Strategic HR Advisor with about 35 years of industry experience. She currently advises several Indian and multinational corporations and is on the Board of several companies. Hema, until 2005, was the Senior Vice-President and Global Head of Human Resources for Infosys Technologies. In this capacity she designed and drove the HR agenda for Infosys globally, as it scaled up from 250 employees in 1992 to 40,000 employees in 2005. Under her HR Leadership, Infosys won several „Best Employer of the Year‟ awards in India and was placed in Top 100 rankings, overseas. She has won several awards and accolades including three HR Professional of the Year Awards and listings amongst the “25 Most Powerful Women in India” and “Successful Women Professionals in IT”.

Asha Rai is a senior media professional and the Resident Editor of the Times of India’s Bengaluru edition. It is the largest English paper in Karnataka. She is also responsible for the three editions TOI produces in Mysuru, Hubballi and Mangaluru. Asha is  a senior editorial resource for the paper, an , a writer, a mentor and editor of stories. She has a keen interest in urban affairs, of stories that intersect business, city and politics. n a career spanning three decades she has worked with the Economic Times (where she was the Deputy Resident Editor of ET, Bangalore, when she left), the Business Standard and the Times of India in various capacities in addition to launching a city magazine in a short entrepreneurial stint.

Eric Savage is the Co-Founder & CEO of Unitus Capital (UC).  Eric moved to India in 2007 to help set up UC, an impact focused investment bank, and has led the company in raising almost US$2 billion for various impact businesses.  He has had the privilege of working with many innovative companies that do life changing work in the fields of financial inclusion, affordable health care, renewable energy, affordable education, women empowerment, and agriculture. Previously, Eric ran Citigroup’s Asian investment banking franchise in the power and infrastructure sectors. Eric was based in NYC and Hong Kong for 14 years with Citigroup /Salomon Brothers.  Eric also headed Salomon’s utilities sector equity research and was selected to Institutional Investors’ All-Asia research team.