Our speakers

Bejul Somaia, MD, Lightspeed Venture Partners

Bejul Somaia is Managing Director of Lightspeed India Partners Advisors LLP, which advises Lightspeed Venture Partners, a leading global venture capital firm with more than $3B in capital under management. Mr. Somaia established Lightspeed’s India activity in 2008 and has over eighteen years of operating, entrepreneurial and investment experience in the US and India. He was previously Co-CEO of Twiga Fiberglass, a leading manufacturer of building materials in India, and founder and Chairman of Openlist (acquired by Marchex, Inc).

Earlier in his career, Mr. Somaia was an investment professional at General Catalyst Partners, a strategy consultant at Bain & Company and an investment banker with Salomon Brothers.  Mr. Somaia has advised on investments in a number of Indian companies including Oyo Rooms, Indian Energy Exchange, Limeroad, Craftsvilla, OneAssist, Fresh Menu and Shuttl. He holds a BSc in Economics from the London School of Economics and MBA from Harvard Business School.

@bsomaia

Belson Coutinho, Co-Founder and Chief Marketing & Experience Officer (CMO & CXO), Akasa Air

Ben Mathias, ED, NEA

Ben joined NEA in 2006 to focus on investments in the rapidly growing Indian markets. In January 2007, he launched New Enterprise Associates (India) Pvt. Ltd. and opened its Bangalore office. He is currently on the board of ValueFirst, Nova Medical Centers, NephroLife, InTarvo and Novatium and works closely with Intellisys, Deeya Energy and NEA's other India related investments.

Prior to joining NEA, Ben held senior positions at E2open (NASDAQ: EOPN) and  i2 Technologies (acquired by JDA Software). Previously, Ben spent a few years at PwC Consulting (acquired by IBM) as a part of the retail consulting practice.

In his early career, he was at Open Environment Corporation and built application development tools for Distributed Computing. Ben received his Master of Science in Engineering Sciences from Dartmouth College and his Bachelor of Technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.

Benaifer Malandkar, CIO, RAAY Investments

A seasoned financial markets professional, Benaifer Malandkar is the Chief Investment Officer at RAAY Global Investments- the family office of the Amit Patni Group of Patni Computers. The promoter family divested their stake in May 2011 to I-Gate Corporation at USD 1.5 bn. She is responsible for investment management of the group including identification, evaluation, deal execution, and monitoring every investment across a gamut of diverse asset classes including public markets.

Additionally, she has served as a Director on the Board of Bombay Shirt Company and an advisor to the Board of Waterfield Advisors, a fast growing Multi Family Office firm. She has also served as a Director on the Board of Nirvana Venture Advisors, a Digital & Internet Venture Fund and currently is a Board Director at AD Ventures, a music content and live events company as well as a Board Director at Web Talkies Pvt Ltd, a regional content creating company.

Benaifer’s forte lies in end-to-end setting up of new businesses and following that up with a robust performance. She has a demonstrated track record in identifying early stage and unlisted company investments, succession planning, and estate management. She has raised funds for early stage and mid stage companies, and been instrumental in the leading the business strategy for a few ventures to achieve sustainable profitability. A well networked professional, she is recognized for business and market intelligence, a critical skill in the investments field. 

Across the multiple organisations that she has worked in, including Citibank, ICICI Prudential AMC, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and SMIFS securities, she has consciously chosen new roles, thereby wide-basing her exposure and proficiency. With experience of over 22 years in various corporates she has gathered considerable understanding and comprehension of portfolio management, equity and debt markets, asset management, and retail & private banking industries. 

She is often invited to speak at national and international industry events of repute and often writes opinion pieces in various publications. Benaifer received her post graduation degree in Masters in Business Administration from JDBIMS, Mumbai.

Benaifer Malandkar, CIO, RAAY Global Investments

Ms. Benaifer Malandkar brings more than 14 years of financial experience in the field of banking, debt, asset management and private banking. She is one of the founding team members of RAAY Global Investments. Prior to joining RAAY, she has held a significant position in the core strategy team of ICICI Prudential Asset Management. She has also held key positions in Citibank and RBS over her tenure.

Ms. Malandkar completed her MBA from JDBIMS Institute, Mumbai.

Benoit Ducorps, CEO, SPARKER

Benoît is an entrepreneur with over two decades of experience in technical and innovative fields, particularly inspired by innovation in sustainable mobility. Benoît holds an engineering degree in electronic systems from Supelec in France and an MBA from INSEAD.

He led complex projects in the aerospace industry with Thales and in the railway industry with Bombardier working with many different cultures in 5 countries. He later joined Nexus Automotive International with a mandate to manage innovative projects and new models for the automotive aftermarket sector.

Benoît founded SPARKER in December 2022 with the ambition to accelerate innovation in sustainable mobility by finding new ways to connect startups with the automotive sector.

Benson Samuel, CTO & Founder, Coinsecure.in

Benson Samuel is a person known for laying the framework for Bitcoin India. He is among the earliest bitcoin evangelists and activists and blogs about bitcoin space in India. He started the first India bitcoin Meetup chapter in early 2011.Benson Samuel at HackCoin said, "It (block chain) is definitely picking up, people are trying to understand it better. It can be used to make excellent products in banking and finance, contracts, exchange of tokens and many other things.

@bensonsamuel

Bert van der Vaart, Co-Founder, SEAF

Bert van der Vaart was one of two co-founders of SEAF in 1989, when it was known as the CARE Small Business Assistance Corporation (CARESBAC). SEAF invests in small and midcap enterprises in more than 23 emerging markets globally, managing almost $500 million as of December 31, 2008. After serving as SEAF's EVP, he served as Director-General of CARESBAC-Polska, SEAF's first fund, which during his direction completed 27 investments and realized its first 6 exits. In 1997, Mr. van der Vaart became SEAF’s CEO and President, where he has been involved with the establishment and supervision of each SEAF fund, including frequent visits to each SEAF fund office. SEAF has made more than 275 investments, and has realized more than 155 exits. SEAF has offices in 19 countries and employs more than 100 professionals globally. It characteristically focuses on improving the management capacity and transparency of each investment it makes and proactively guiding the company to exit.

From 1984 through 1994, Mr. van der Vaart was a Partner and Associate with Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington, D.C, Frankfurt, and Brussels where he specialized in corporate law, primarily with respect to corporate financings and mergers and acquisitions for such entites as Vortech, Waverly Publishing, General Dynamics, Investcorp, Fleetwood, Hilton International, Kellogg’s, Honda Motors, and Westinghouse. From 1983 through 1984, he was a management consultant with Bain & Company in London and Munich. Mr. van der Vaart holds a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he also studied finance at Yale School of Management; a B.A. in Politics and Economics and a M. Phil. in Economics from Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar; and a B.A. from the University of North Carolina, where he was a Morehead Scholar. A Dutch national and dual citizen of the Netherlands and the United States, he speaks Dutch, English, German, French, and some Polish.

Bertram Dsouza, VP & Head, Digital Payments | FinTech Strategy & Partnerships, Kotak Mahindra Bank

BG Krishnan, CEO & Founder, eShakti.com Pvt. Ltd

B G Krishnan (BG) is the Founder & CEO of eShakti.com P Ltd, an online women’s fashion brand that is ranked #1 in the USA for custom-clothing serving the mainstream American market. What drives him is the opportunity to build a global fashion brand from India.

His career has included heading sales and marketing in consumer product companies in the first half of his career until he turned entrepreneur via a media sales business. The arrival of the internet made it clear that brand marketing and distribution will change in unprecedented ways but most of all it would be possible for small companies offering great value to compete with bigger ones, and that too across geographies. As a brand marketing person, the internet was an exciting development for BG!  This led to the launch of eShakti in 2001, with Angel Investors from the USA, as an online retailer that sold lifestyle products from India to the Indian diaspora. From there, eShakti, sensed a much larger opportunity in the mainstream American market, and made a decisive change in 2008 to fashion clothing for American women.

eShakti raised  Series A venture-capital funding from IDG in 2011 and Series B from IvyCap and IDG in 2014, helping the company to register a steep 10x rise in top-line over the last 3 years.

BG earned a BSc in Physics from Loyola College, Chennai and an MBA from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management, Mumbai.