Our speakers

S. S. Acharya, CMD, NSIC (SRI Fund)

Dr. Subhransu Sekhar Acharya is the Chairman- cum- Managing Director (CMD), The National Small Industries Corporation Ltd., A Public Sector Organization of Government of India.  Prior to his present assignment, Dr. Acharya was the Chief General Manager, Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), New Delhi.

Dr. Acharya is a Ph.D. in Management, Post Graduate in Science (M.Sc.), a Post Graduate in Business Administration (MBA) and a Certified Associate of Indian Institute of Banking & Finance (CAIIB). He has experience of over 3 decades in various facets of MSME Financing and Development including Credit, SME Rating, Risk Management, Bills Financing, New Product Development, Business Planning, Entrepreneurship Development, Innovation financing, Micro-Finance, Start-Up mentoring etc.

Dr. Acharya was a recipient of Prestigious Chevening Fellowship wherein, he underwent a course in Environment Management & Sustainable Development. The program was organized by University of Bradford and University of Manchester, UK on behalf of British Foreign Office who administer the Fellowship through British Council. During his stint there, he had exposure to the working of SMEs in UK where he worked on establishing the commercial benefits of adopting environment friendly technology by comparing the same for SMEs of India and UK. Besides, he has also attended “SME Cluster Development Program” at the prestigious International Training Centre of ILO at Turin, Italy.

Shri Acharya was invited by World Bank to discuss India’s SME Development
Financing Story at Harare, Zimbabwe. He is regularly invited by various B’Schools / Universities / IITs etc. for delivering talks and taking sessions on various facets on a whole range of topics ranging from “Corporate Social Responsibility”, “Entrepreneurship”, “MSME Financing”, “Financial Inclusion”, “Motivational aspects” etc. Shri Acharya has several publications / articles published in various journals to his credit.  He has co-authored to book on Managing Innovation & Incubation titled “Seed to Sapling” : The Incubator Way”.

Dr. Acharya is an adjunct Professor in Innovation & Entrepreneurship Area at ‘Birla Global University,’ Bhubaneswar.

S. Sriniwasan(Srini), Managing Director, Kotak Reality Fund

S. Subramanian, Chief Executive Officer, Kaya Ltd. India

With over 19 years of experience in the areas of Sales, Category Management, General Management, and Manufacturing, S. Subramanian is presently the Chief Executive Officer at Kaya India Limited. His specialization lies in the areas of Sales & Distribution, Retail Management, Modern Trade and Trade Marketing. He has handled diverse assignments across industries like FMCG, Consumer Durables, Paints and Retail straddling roles both in strategy and execution in corporate and field.

He has been associated with the Marico Group for over 6 years and his last 2 years has been with Kaya Ltd. as Head Operations. He has been instrumental in the Kaya journey in areas pertaining to Service Quality, Operations, Real Estate, New retail formats and IT.

Prior to this, he was associated with a series of reputed brands and organizations like Asian Paints India Ltd., Reckitt Benckiser India Ltd., Whirlpool, to name a few.

Holding B.E. Chemical and M.Sc. Chemistry from BITS Pilani in 1992, he has completed his PGDM in Marketing and International Business from NMIMS Mumbai in 1997.

S. Susindran, Chief Founder, Sabre International

Mr. Susindran, a first generation entrepreneur, is the Founder, Chairman cum Managing Director of Sabare International Ltd. He hails from a small town named Karur with a vision to build an enterprise which has a global presence.

Sabare International Limited is a 250 crore home textile company with operations in India, USA and China. It caters to the top retailers of home textiles in USA and Europe which are Fortune 500 companies.

Mr. Susindran has been successful in evolving an unique business model in home textiles. This model gives complete holistic solution to Fortune 500 Retailers in home textiles from the product to supply chain management. As part of the global strategy, he has started a manufacturing facility and Distribution Centre in USA (Sabare USA Inc.) and operating successfully.

Mr. Susindran, is a man of visionary with global dreams and his consistent performance and success is a valid proof to the fact that Indian Entrepreneurs/first general entrepreneurs can reach global heights with their in the highly competitive global arena.

Mr.Susindran has over 18 years experience and possesses immense knowledge about the global textile industry and he who holds his list of ideals to follow and get inspiration out from Dhirubhai Ambani to Mr.Narayanamurthy. He is a Chartered accountant and a Graduate in Law.

S. Suthakar, Managing Director, Aqua Designs India Ltd

Mr S. Suthakar, Managing Director, Aqua Designs India Ltd is a first generation entrepreneur. Studied mechanical engineering in Tirunelveli. The company Aqua Designs is into water and waste water treatment plant installation and consultancy, and boasts a growing list of clients that includes a few multi-national companies. He has 350 employees on his rolls and the company reported a turnover of about Rs 50 crore in 2008-09. He started off with a seed capital of Rs 1.30 lakh out of his provident fund amount, from a rented office space with just three employees. He now enjoys a credit limit of Rs 43 crore.

Aqua Designs offering clients a range of services – right from doing environmental impact assessment studies to designing and erecting treatment plants to operating and maintaining them to supply of consumables to run the systems. He aims to grow his company to Rs 500 crore by 2015 and is open to the idea of diluting a small stake to private equity players if that is going to help him grow.

S. Venkatraman, Partner, Rabo Equity Advisors Pvt. Ltd.

S. Venkatraman is a Partner & Head of Mumbai office with Rabo Equity Advisors, the Investment Advisor to India Agri Business Fund 1 and 2. This is the first private equity fund in Asia dedicated to the Food & Agribusiness sector. At Rabo Equity, Venkat is the senior member of the investment team, involved in deal ideation, origination, evaluation, investment, execution and portfolio management.

Venkat has a B.Tech from Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and an MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.

Venkat has over 22 years of work experience which comprises
Six  years with Rabo Equity Advisors Pvt. Ltd
Eight and half years with Rabo India Finance Ltd (100% subsidiary of Rabobank International), where he headed the Food & Agribusiness Research and Advisory team (FAR).
7 years in the consumer marketing space, spread across Johnson & Johnson and Marico Ltd, both based in Mumbai (India). 1 year with Essar Steel in the Project Management team

Venkat has a sound understanding of the sector dynamics across food and agribusiness sectors (F&A). He has authored publications in all these sectors. He has also spoken at various industry forums and showcased his sector knowledge. He has also advised various domestic and international corporates on entry strategy, market study and implementation assistance in the F&A space.

S.K Roongta, CMD, National Seed Corporations Ltd

Shri S.K.Roongta is an MBA (Marketing) from Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS), Pillani.  He has got rich experience of having worked both in private sector as well as public sector companies during the last 38 years. Before joining National Seeds Corporation (NSC) as its Chairman cum Managing Director on Ist April, 2009, he had worked with two other PSUs viz.

NationalTextile Corporation and Cotton Corporation of India for about 33 years. During his tenure, the turnover of NSC has more than doubled during the last three years.  Under his stewardship,  NSC was elevated from Schedule ‘C’ to Schedule ‘B’ and awarded the Mini Ratna Category-I status by the Department of Public Enterprises and Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India during the year 2010-11.

NSC was also given SCOPE Award for Excellence and Outstanding contribution to the Public Sector Management-Institutional-III for the year 2009-10 by the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India on 31.01.2012. Shri Roongta is also on the Board of Directors of seven State Seed Corporations.

S.K Sharma, MD, SBA Hydro & Renewable Energy

S.Sivakumar, CEO, Times Private Treaties

Sivakumar is a fellow member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India as well as Institute of Cost and Works Accountants of India. He has been with the BCCL group for over 19 Years and has handled diversified functions such as Finance, M & A, Marketing & Sales and now leads the Times Private Treaties Business.

At the BCCL group he has played a pivotal role in all its new business initiates i.e. Internet, Radio, OOH Ventures etc and is on Board of some of these companies. Sivakumar also works very actively with the Vice Chairman of the group, Mr. Samir Jain in ideating, incubating and implementing ideas for BCCL media business.

Sivakumar pursues his hobby of physical exercise and spirituality which he believes are essential for fitness of mind and body. He enjoys his occasional treks to the Himalayas.

Saad Siddiqui, General Partner, Titanium Ventures