Our speakers

Mukund Mohan, , Angel investor

Mukund Mohan founded BuzzGain (Sold to Meltwater in 2009). He has founded and successfully sold 3 startups before BuzzGain.  

He was head of product marketing for Mercury responsible for the direction and customer success of the company’s Application Management solutions. Prior to Mercury, he was Vice President of Operations at Conslient, a software company focused on process automation. In this role, he managed a team of sales and services personnel and was responsible for customer success. In addition, he held product and management positions at Ariba and Asera and began his career at Cisco Systems.

Mukund served on the board of advisors of iConclude, Platform46, Smart Crowds and is on the board of Semantic Defense and Kinetic Brains.

Mukund studied at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County pursuing a master’s degree in computer science and holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering and computer science from the University of Mysore in India.

Mukund Mudras, Co-Founder & CEO, Heckyl

Mukund is Co-founder and CEO of Heckyl Technologies (India), a provider of real time financial data analytics. He has a rich experience of finance and technology backed with deep-rooted passion for excellence in client relationship and delivery management.

Many believe that Heckyl teams’ penchant for pushing the bar on delivering results with his no-pretenses go-getter attitude have been the leading forces behind Heckyl’s fast gaining reputation as ‘most innovative’ and  ‘India’s coolest start-ups’ in 2014. It is no surprise then that Heckyl has been featured twice in the ‘Smart CEO’ list of starts-ups and cover story.

Heckyl has climbed the echelons of awards and achievements in each of the successive years - Techsparks winners 2011 for Innovation, Winner Nasscom Emerge 50 for Innovations in 2012, Winner UKTI for most Innovative Indian Company in 2013 and inauguration of its first subsidiary at the 3rd largest tech cluster of the world.

Mukund has around 14 years of Techno-commercial and techno-functional experience in Information Technology field. He has managed teams across the globe with both onsite-offshore delivery model for many a complex projects.

Mukund is best known for leading strategic initiatives and his forte lies in growing development centers, earning a reputation with Internet technologies, software development along with Project Management and Business Development.

Mukund has completed his Masters in Software Systems with executive management from Indian Institute of Management - Kozhikode.

Muneesh Chawla, Managing Director, Blue River Capital

Mr. Chawla has over 20 years of corporate finance and private equity experience in India. Prior to co-founding Blue River Capital in 2005, he was Business Head, Corporate Finance at GE Capital Commercial Finance, where he managed their corporate finance business in North and South India. Prior to that, Mr. Chawla was the CEO of IL&FS Investment Managers (?IIML?), the private equity arm of IL&FS, a leading financial services company in India. Between 1996 and 2004, he led investments across several sectors (IT, Telecom, Business Process Outsourcing, Media, Retail, Life Sciences and Manufacturing) and structured successful exits. Mr Chawla was part of the investment banking group at IL&FS since 1993, and prior to that, worked in the Corporate Finance Department of the UB Group, a diversified industrial group headquartered at Bangalore.Mr. Chawla has a B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology in Kanpur and an M.B.A. from the University of Texas at Austin, U.S.A.

Munender Soperna, Chief Information Officer, Dr Lal PathLabs

Munesh Khanna, Managing Director - Investment Banking, Centrum Capital Limited

With over 20 years experience in the financial, regulatory and taxation domain Munesh Khanna has an extensive network of relationships with Indian Corporates. Munesh is a rank holding Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (Commerce Graduate from DAV College). Apart from an Investment and Management experience, Munesh has been involved on the sell side Investment Banking and Corporate Advisory services with special emphasis on raising resources from Capital Markets and Private Equity, Merger and Acquisition, establishing joint ventures and corporate restructuring.

Munesh Khanna has been responsible for closing one of the largest overseas acquisition by an Indian company — Tata Tea’s acquisition of the Tetley group in UK, (at the time was the biggest foreign acquisition by an Indian company). During Munesh tenure as Managing Director of NM Rothschild, he was also responsible for closing the mammoth and complex Dabhol deal.( with an exposure of almost Rs 5,000 crore) . Other deals handled by Rothschild during Munesh’s tenure were, Insurance merger Axa’s JV with the Bharti group, Air Deccan’s private equity deal, GDR issue of Arvind Mills, issue of HDFC and GDR issue of Indian Cements.

Munesh Khanna is also a member of Young Presidents Organisation (YPO), a worldwide network of 20,000 leaders in 100 nations. He has been a member of CII, a member of the Executive Committee of Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and industry (FICCI), and co- Chairman of the Finance & Capital Market committee of FICCI. In September 2008, he was a member of Business India’s Panel for selection of India’s Best Bank.

Munesh Khanna, Head - Corporate Finance, PwC India

Munesh leads the Corporate Finance and Business Restructuring Services practice in India. Previously held senior Investment Banking and Corporate Advisory roles at Grant Thornton, Arthur Anderson, NM Rothschild & Sons and DSP Merrill Lynch. He was General Partner at Halcyon - A structured debt funded by Seth Klarman’s Fund Baupost, and has over 25 years of experience in the financial, regulatory and taxation domain.
Over the years Munesh been instrumental in materialising number of private equity, M&A and restructuring deals besides being the brain behind successful IPOs like Cairn Ltd and Air Deccan. In his advisory role he has facilitated Dr Reddy’s acquisition of Beta Pharma, acquisition of Tetley Tea Business by Tata Tea Ltd, acquisition of PowerGen India by Tata Power, helping Times of India Group raise fund through Radio Mirchi’s IPO and restructuring of MTNL & BSNL, to name a few. A Chartered Accountant by profession Munesh holds Bachelor’s degree in Commerce from DAV College.

Munish Dayal, Partner, Baring Private Equity Partners

Munish is a Senior Partner with Barings Private Equity Partners India since May 2007. He heads the investment practice in Banking, Financial Services & Insurance (BFSI) and also serves as an Operating Partner. He has over 28 years of global experience in establishing and building businesses in the BFSI industry, having worked with Citigroup for 16 years as  Managing Director across major markets (London, Europe, Singapore, Middle East, Africa, India).  His roles ranged from global transaction services, risk management to asset-based finance, culminating as the Regional Head of SME and Retail mass markets  for Asia Pacific.  After his tenure at Citigroup in 2005, he joined a start-up bank in India called Yes Bank where as integral part of the management team and President of Business Banking, he was instrumental in building the mid-market business which aided the bank IPO. At present he serves as the Chairman of Infrasoft Tech Limited, as a director on the board of RMZ Corp and Proactive Data Systems. He also serves as a member of the audit committee and remuneration and compensation committee of various portfolio companies. He is an elected member of the Executive Committee (EC) of the Indian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association of India (IVCA).

Munish holds a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce with Honors from the Shri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi University, and an MBA from the Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi University.

Murali Krishna V, Head-Investments & Strategy, Kolte-Patil Family Office

Murali Krishna Joined Kolte Patil Family office (KPFO) as Head of Investments with over 15 years of experience in Investment and capital markets. The promoter family owns Kolte Patil Developers Limited (NSE: KOLTEPATIL BSE: 532924 ), a public listed real estate developer. He is currently responsible for investment management of the group including identification, evaluation, deal execution, and monitoring every investment asset classes including public markets.  Also responsible for providing strategic direction as Head of Investments to the SFO and manage global investment portfolio for the family.

A science graduate in Mathematics from Kerala university  and after receiving his MBA from the IBS, Hyderabad , worked with HSBC and HDFC  where he managed equity and fixed income portfolios for individuals and corporates in the private banking space. Later on he worked with Famy Care Ltd ( Taparia’s Family Office ) and Unilazer Ventures Ltd  ( Ronnie Screwvala Family Office ) in heading  the SFO investments across asset classes. He has worked with Country Garden holdings Co Ltd (HKG: 2007), managing the Financing & Structuring for investments in India and Sri Lanka. He specialized in investing in alternative assets such as private credit, private equity, and real estate.

He is also on the board of investee companies of the group. KPFO website : www.kpfoventures.com

Murali Krishnan, CEO, The Nilgiri Dairy Farm Pvt. Ltd

Murali Krishnan is currently the CEO of Nilgiris Dairy Farm Pvt Ltd. part of Rs 32000 Future group. Besides the Nilgiris Brand Buisness he is also overseeing the convenience format expansion in Delhi and Mumbai for the Future Group.

Nilgiris is a Heritage Food Brand , since 1905. With strong Manufacturing capabilities in Bakery and Dairy products the company has been focused on innovation led growth. It has a network of 155 Food and grocery convenience stores across Southern states operated through a Franchisee network. Murali and his team have been instrumental in the turnaround of the group making it one of the very few Retail chains to have turned profit able`. He has been instrumental in rejuvenating the brand and making it relevant to changing Indian consumer. Under his leadership the chain has achieved highest sales per sq ft in the industry and continues to grow at a healthy pace with a very strong Private label brand portfolio. The convenience format in Delhi and Mumbai has a network of 125 company owned stores and his team has been given the responsibility of building a strong convenience footprint.

Future Group acquired Nilgiris in November , 2014.  Murali was CEO for 5 years , with PE fund  Actis and saw through a successful transition as business got sold to Future Group.. Prior to that he was President of Subhiksha trading services in North India for a brief period of about 18 months handling all the verticals - Supermarket, Pharmacy and Telecom. A seasoned FMCG professional he has worked across geographies in India with some leading brands - Wipro Lighting, Gillette and Perfetti.

Murali completed his BE (Mechanical Engineering) from Birla Institute of technology and went to do his Masters in Marketing Management from NMIMS Mumbai - batch of 1994.

Murali M, Chairman & MD, Shriram Properties

An alumnus from the prestigious Harvard Business School, Mr. Murali Malayappan is the Managing Director of Shriram Properties. Born in Pudukottai, Tamil Nadu, he first started out his career as a civil engineer. His talent and skill soon caught the attention of Shri.R.Thyagarajan, founder and Chairman of Shriram Group. Under his leadership, Shriram Properties grew to even greater heights.

Through a foundation of trust, transparency and credibility, he has been instrumental in growing the business exponentially. But for him, the biggest focus is to make Shriram Properties the most trusted property developer in the industry. As one of the biggest property developers in India, his objective is to make the 'Housing for All' mission a reality. Mr. Murali Malayappan, MD of Shriram Properties, also frequently participates in several national and international seminars and has delivered guest lectures at premier business schools like IIM, Bangalore. He is a former member of governing real estate bodies like CREDAI and industry forums like CII and FICCI. He is also actively involved in various social welfare programs to help the blind, differently-abled, underprivileged children, and the destitute through NGOs like Give Life, Chennai.