Our speakers

Mukul Singhal, Principal, Saif Partners

Mukul Singhal joined SAIF in 2010 and is currently Principal. Prior to joining SAIF, he worked at Canaan Partners, an early stage venture capital firm. Mukul is a TiE Charter Member and actively participates in the Indian entrepreneurial ecosystem. His primary area of focus is early stage investments. Mukul is B.Tech from IIT Kanpur and MBA from Indian School of Business, Hyderabad.

Mukul Singhal, Co-Founder & Managing Director, Pravega Ventures

Mukul Singhal is Co Founder and Managing Director of Pravega Ventures – an early stage venture capital firm. Mukul focusses on investments in Internet, Mobile and Software Products. Mukul has been investing in India since last 12 years. Prior to finding Pravega, he was with leading venture firms like SAIF Partners and Canaan Partners.

He has led investments and served on board of several internet companies in India like Proptiger, UrbanClap, Zovi, IndustryBuying, Travel Triangle and NoBroker. At present, he is on board of Pravega portfolio companies – Workex, Grubox, CroFarm.

Mukul Singhal , Co-founder, Pravega Ventures

Mukul Singhal is Co Founder and Partner at Pravega Ventures. Pravega Ventures is an early stage fund focused for seed stage and pre series A stage. Before Pravega, Mukul led the seed stage investments at SAIF Partners. In the past, He has led investments in companies like UrbanClap, IndustryBuying, TravelTriangle, NoBroker, PropTiger, Tracxn, App Iterate and Qikwell.

He is Bachelor of Technology from IIT Kanpur and MBA from ISB, Hyderabad.

Mukul Sukhani, Sr. VP & Head-Small Business Payment Solutions, Citibank India

Mukul is Head of Small Business Payment Solutions at Citi since 2011. In his current role, he has been leading a team of specialized professionals in acquiring & digital payments, merchant partnerships, networks and corporate cards. With over 22 years of experience, he has dedicated the last decade specializing in payments and loyalty programs.

He is responsible for launching the first fully integrated and certified mobile card acceptance solution in India for Citibank globally.

He started his career in 1991 as an entrepreneur for over five years and subsequently moved to work for leading brands in India which includes American Express and Loyalty MINE, a startup firm engaged in developing loyalty programs.

He is a Chemical Engineer and has completed his management program from XLRI, Jamshedpur.

Mukund Krishnaswami, Founder and Managing Director, Lighthouse Funds

Krishnaswami is a Founder and Managing Director of Lighthouse Funds. Previously,  Krishnaswami was a member of the Private Equity Division of Lehman Brothers in New York, where he was responsible for direct equity investments in both traditional and high growth industries through Lehman Brothers $2 billion merchant banking fund.

His experience includes LBO/take-private transactions, recapitalisations, early to mid-stage venture capital investments, private equity and structured transactions. He began his career in the Corporate Finance and Strategy Practice of McKinsey and Company in New York.

He serves on the Board of Directors of Krilacon Group, RCG Management, Zero Technologies, SAI Investments, Mon Cheri Bridals and Global Affiliates. He is also Co-Founder and Senior Editor of The Linneman Letter, a leading macro-economic and investment research publications for global real estate investors. He holds undergraduate degrees summa cum laude in Economics and Computer Science from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Master of Business Administration from the Wharton School.

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.