Our speakers

Rahul Khanna, MD, Canaan Partners India

Rahul Khanna has over fifteen years of investing and operating experience in ICT across India and the U.S. Having returned from Silicon Valley in 2005, Rahul has played a key role in the development of the venture ecosystem in India and is well recognized as an active investor in several high growth companies.

Prior to joining Canaan India in early 2011, Rahul was the founding director of Clearstone Venture Advisors, a firm that manages investments in India for Clearstone Venture Partners. At Clearstone, Rahul was responsible for building the platform that would focus on early stage investments in verticals like financial services, telecom, media and education. While at Clearstone, he served on the Boards of Billdesk and Games2Win.

During his time in Silicon Valley, Rahul was Area Director Asia-Pacific at Sonim Technologies. Having joined Sonim during its inception, he was responsible for the company's global marketing and sales initiatives including key markets like China and India. Prior to spending time in the Valley, he was part of the team that launched Hutchison Telecom's mobile operations in India during the mid-nineties.

Rahul earned an MBA in 2000 from the Kellogg Graduate School at Northwestern University. He also serves on the Investment Committee of SONG, a social impact fund sponsored by the Soros Economic Development Fund, Pierre Omidyar and Google. 

Rahul Khanna, Managing Partner, Trifecta Capital | @TrifectaCapital

Rahul Khanna is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Trifecta Capital, India’s first Venture Debt fund. He was previously, Managing Director at Canaan Partners, a global venture capital fund with $4 billion under management. Rahul has twenty years of investing and operating experience in Technology, Media and Telecoms.

Having returned to India from Silicon Valley in 2005, Rahul has played a key role in the development of the venture capital ecosystem in India and has been an active investor in several high growth companies like Billdesk, LoyltyRewardz, Equitas and Naaptol.

Rahul also supports the startup ecosystem by advising early stage companies and making angel investments. Rahul has an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Rahul Khosla, MD, Max India Limited

Rahul Kothari, Business Head, PayUbiz | @PayUbiz_India

Rahul currently leads PayUbiz business. He has more than 12 years of experience in strategy and process consulting, practice development, and business transformation. He has worked across clients in Australia, US, Europe and India helping solve business problems directly impacting their topline and bottomline. In his earlier roles, he led transformation engagements at WNS, was a consultant with Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and software consultant at Symatec. He is a B.Tech from IIT Kanpur and MBA from ISB Hyderabad.

Rahul Kumar, Managing Director, Lactalis India

Rahul Maheshwari, Investor, Verlinvest

Rahul Mehta, Director, Argonaut Private Equity

Rahul is a Director at Argonaut Private Equity and heads India investments. Mr. Mehta is on the board of eYantra Inc and an observer on the board of Koutons Retail and VKL Spices. Rahul was previously a Principal at Blue River Capital, a $140 million India focused private equity fund.

A co-founder of the fund, Rahul sourced and executed transactions across a variety of sectors including financial services, manufacturing and logistics. He has also held positions at ChrysCapital, one of India?s largest independent private equity firms, Greenhill & Co in New York in its merchant banking and investment banking division and Merrill Lynch in New York in its investment banking division.

Mr. Mehta graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.A. in Mathematics and Economics from Cornell University and holds an M.B.A. from MIT?s Sloan School of Management, U.S.A.

Rahul Mehta, Advisor, George Kaiser Family Office

Rahul has over twenty-five years of experience in the financial services industry across the United States and India. He has invested capital across all asset classes including venture, private equity and platform deals. 

Rahul was Director and Country Head for George Kaiser Family Foundation (Argonaut) for over ten years. He continues to be an advisor. While at GKFF, he invested capital in public markets primarily in the financial services sectors. He has also held positions at ChrysCapital,  Greenhill & Co in New York and Merrill Lynch in its investment banking division.

Rahul graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.A in Mathematics and Economics from Cornell University and holds an MBA from MIT’s Sloan School of Management, USA. He is currently part of the Visiting Faculty of Entrepreneurship at Ashoka University.

Rahul Narvekar, CEO, NDTV Ethnic Retail Ltd (IndianRoots.com)

Rahul Narvekar, a true Mumbaikar and a serial entrepreneur launched 'Indianroots' in July, 2013; this being his fifth venture as a promoter and second in the e-commerce world. From working as a door to door salesman to pay for his education to leading sales campaigns of brands like Dettol at small paan wallahs in Mumbai’s red light district; to peddling Gillete razors in Akbarallys, Rahul's entrepreneurial abilities were getting honed up from his early days itself.

A multi-tasker, by heart, Rahul joined TS - tele-shopping network at UTV, while pursuing a full time business entrepreneurship course. He became a part of Asia's first Interactive music channel named Oxygen in 1999. The company scaled to revenues of 2 crore a year with the best of clients including Coca Cola, Colgate, HLL and so on.

After dabbling for brief stints with Sun City and DLF, Rahul met a European gentleman called Oliver Jung and became an entrepreneur again and launched the e-commerce site that changed the whole dynamics of e-commerce called, www.fashionandyou.com in 2009.

@rahulnarvekar

Rahul Pandit, MD & CEO, Ginger Hotels | @GingerHotel

Rahul leads the Tata group’s pioneering budget lodging business, Ginger Hotels, with 37 operating properties and 32 hotels in pipeline. He has over 23 years of start-up and operating experience across luxury, upscale, mid-scale and budget lodging businesses. Rahul was earlier a founding team member, President and ED of Lemon Tree Hotels where he led its growth, from a start-up, to three distinct brands.

A graduate of IHM Pusa, New Delhi and a former member of the Indian Karate team, he has studied Sales, Innovation and HR management at IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, ISB Hyderabad and Cornell-Nanyang, Singapore. Rahul has worked and trained across India, USA and Singapore with Choice Hotels, Taj Hotels, Spectramind (WIPRO BPO) and Intercontinental Hotels. He also serves as a Member - National Tourism Committee, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).

@rahulpandit1