Leadership

Mr. Adi Godrej is Chairman of the 124-year-old Godrej Group. Established in 1897, Godrej has its roots in India's Independence and Swadeshi movement. Today, the Group enjoys the patronage of 1.2 billion consumers globally across consumer goods, real estate, appliances, agriculture, chemicals, financial services and many other businesses.

Mr. Godrej has been President of several Indian trade and industrial associations. He is the Past Chairman of the Board of the Indian School of Business, and Past President of the Confederation of Indian Industry. He has been a member of the Dean’s Advisory Council of the MIT Sloan School of Management, Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies and a member of the Wharton Asian Executive Board. Mr. Godrej is also a patron of the Himalayan Club. He holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan School of Management.

He is a recipient of several awards and recognitions, including the Padma Bhushan 2013 (the third-highest civilian award in India).

Mr. Nadir Godrej is the Chairman and Managing Director of Godrej Industries Limited.

He holds B. S. degree in Chemical Engineering in 1973 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a M.S. in Chemical Engineering in 1974 from Stanford University. He hasdone an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1976. Since 1977 he has been a Director of Godrej Soaps. He has been very active in developing the animal feed, agricultural inputs and chemicals businesses of Godrej Industries and associate companies. He has been very active in research and has several patents in the field of agricultural chemicals and surfactants. In 2001 Godrej Soaps was renamed to Godrej Industries and he was appointed as the Managing Director of Godrej Industries. He is also the Chairman of Godrej Agrovet Limited and Director of Godrej Properties Limited, subsidiaries of Godrej Industries. He is a Director of Godrej and Boyce, Godrej Consumer Products and other Godrej group companies. He has been active in CLFMA (Compound Livestock Feed Manufacturers Assn. Of India), ICC (Indian Chemical Council) [erstwhile ICMA (Indian Chemical Manufacturers Association)], OTAI (Oil Technologists’ Association of India) and the Alliance Française de Bombay. He is currently the President of the Alliance Française de Bombay. He is on the National Council of CII (Confederation of Indian Industry). He is also very active in the Harvard Business School and M I T Alumni Association in India. The French government awarded him “Chevalier de L’Ordre National du Merite “in 2002 and “Chevalier De La Legion D’ Honneur” in 2008. He has also received Life Time Achievement Awards from OTAI (Oil Technologist Association of India) and Chemexcil and the All India Liquid Bulk Importers and Exporters Association (AILBIEA). The Board of Management of Manav Rachna University has unanimously conferred Mr. Godrej with an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. And he has been inducted as Fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE).

In February 2023, Mr. Godrej received the Hurun award for most respected Indian Industrialist of the Year and was also honored with the Game Changer felicitation at the India Gulf Business Summit 2023 for redefining sustainability in business. Mr. Godrej also received a special award for “Excellence in Healthcare” from the Navabharat Group and Jeevan Gaurav Puraskar by the Maharashtra State Mango Growers Association. He was very recently conferred a Lifetime Achievement Award by CLFMA of India, an apex body for the Livestock industry, for his contributions in the animal feed sector and Life Time Achievement Award from ICC (Indian Chemical Council). He also received a Doctor of Philosophy in Business Management from XIM University, Bhubaneswar in recognition of his contribution to Industry and Society.

Mr. Godrej is deeply committed to the GOOD and GREEN strategies and achievement of set targets for the Godrej Group. He encourages and supports a shared vision value for all programs of Good and Green.

Pirojsha Godrej is the Executive Chairperson of Godrej Properties, Godrej Housing Finance, and Godrej Fund Management and a Non-Executive Director at Godrej Consumer Products and Godrej Agrovet. Pirojsha graduated from the Wharton School of Business in 2002, completed his Masters in International Affairs from Columbia University in 2004, and an MBA from Columbia Business School in 2008. Pirojsha joined GPL in 2004, became an Executive Director in 2008, and was appointed CEO of Godrej Properties in 2012. He has led the company through a phase of rapid growth. In Financial Year 2016, Godrej Properties for the first time became India's #1 publicly listed real estate developer by residential sales, a position it has retained for the past 5 years. Under Pirojsha’s leadership, Godrej Properties has been at the forefront of the sustainable development movement; in 2013, GPL received an award from former President of India, APJ Abdul Kalam for being one of the companies in India from across sectors to have driven the green building movement. In 2020, Godrej Properties ranked #1 amongst listed residential developers across the world in the Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark, an organization committed to rigorous and independent evaluation of the sustainability performance of real assets across the globe. The Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) has awarded Pirojsha the IGBC Green Champion Award 2016 for his contribution to the sustainability of India's built environment.

Tanya serves as the Executive Director and Chief Brand Officer of Godrej Industries Limited, and is responsible for the Godrej Group's brand and communications function, including guiding the Godrej Masterbrand.

Tanya is also a Director on the Board of Godrej Consumer Products Limited and Godrej Agrovet Limited.

She also serves on the boards of Britannia, Escorts, Go Airlines, AIESEC and India@75.

Tanya was a member on the Board of the Bharatiya Mahila Bank between November 2013 and May 2015. She was a trustee of Brown University between 2012 and 2018 and continues to be member of the Brown India Advisory Council and on the Watson Institute Board of Overseers.

Tanya was recognized by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader in 2007. She is AB cum laudé, Economics & Political Science, Brown University, USA, and an alumna of the Harvard Business School.

Ms. Shweta Bhatia had joined Eight Roads Ventures in April 2018 and leads the technology, consumer and financial services (TCF) investments team in India. She has over 15 years of experience in private equity and finance, most recently as Head of Asia Investments for the Venture Capital & Growth Equity team at Goldman Sachs Investment Partners. Ms. Shweta Bhatia began her career in the investment banking division of Goldman Sachs based in New York and worked in a growth equity investing role at Warburg Pincus in Mumbai before re-joining Goldman Sachs in 2010. Her key focus sectors include consumer, enterprise SaaS, and fintech including experience with investments such as Whatfix, Chaipoint, Shadowfax, MoEngage, Early Salary and FarEye. Ms. Shweta Bhatia has received an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA in Computer Science and Economics from Smith College.

Nitin Nabar serves as a Director on the Board of Godrej Industries Limited. He is also the Manufacturing Council Head for the Godrej Group and the Executive Director and President, Godrej Industries Limited (Chemicals).

Nitin started his career with Godrej as an Executive Trainee in 1989 at the erstwhile Godrej Soaps Limited. Over the years, he has worked in leadership positions across diverse business functions including sales, marketing, commodities, exports, imports and purchase.

He played a key role in building and expanding the export market of the Chemicals business. Under his leadership, the business now exports products to over 80 countries.

Nitin also actively champions environmental sustainability initiatives across the business.

Nitin is the Chairman - Cosmetics of Chemexcil, an export promotion council for the chemicals industry. He has also been a member of the taskforce setup by the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers to help in the growth of the oleochemicals industry in India.

Nitin has a B.Sc (Technology) degree from University of Mumbai, Department of Chemical Technology and an MBA from Welingkar Institute of Management, Development & Research in Mumbai.

Dr. Ganapati Yadav is the Founding Vice Chancellor and R. T. Mody Distinguished Professor, and Tata Chemicals Darbari Seth Distinguished Professor of Innovation and Leadership of the Institute of Chemical Technology (ICT), Mumbai. He is J. C. Bose National Fellow, Conjoint Professor University of New Castle, Australia and University of Saskatchewan, Canada. He was conferred Padma Shri by the President of India in 2016 for his outstanding contributions to Science and Engineering. He has won over 125 national and international honours, awards, fellowships, editorships, etc. He has completed B. Chem. Eng. Ph.D. (Tech.), D.Sc. (Hon. Causa, DYPK), FTWAS, FNA, FASc, FNASc, FNAE, FRSC (UK), FISTE , FIChemE (UK), FIIChE, FICS. He is a member of Maharashtra Innovation Council. He is Chairman, Waste Management Expert Committee, DST-Govt of India, and serves on Boards of two companies as Independent Director. Recently he was a member of review of functioning of Central Insecticide Board and Registration Committee of Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Review Committee of IISER Pune, Member of Selection Committee of Directors of IIT, MHRD, etc.

Mr. Mathew Eipe joined Godrej Soaps Limited as a management trainee in 1977 after completing his graduate Chemical Engineering studies at IIT Mumbai, and his post graduate studies in Business Management at IIM Calcutta. In 1994, he was appointed as Sr. Vice President Marketing in the Chemicals Division of Godrej Soaps Limited from 1995 to 2000. He led the successful turnaround and integration of GGIC (Gujarat Godrej Innovative Chemicals) with Godrej Soaps Limited. In 2001, after the demerger of Godrej Soaps Limited he was appointed as Executive Director and President (Chemicals) at Godrej Industries Limited and headed the Chemicals business till his retirement in 2013. During 2010 to 2013, he led the team that successfully relocated the Chemicals factory from Vikhroli to a world class manufacturing facility at Ambernath near Mumbai. He served on the Board of Godrej Industries Limited from 2001 till his retirement in 2013. He was a member of the Group Management Committee from 1994 till 2013.

Monaz Noble is an accomplished finance leader with over 33 years of wide ranging experience including on Board of listed MNC and Indian companies. She is on the Board of Ageas Federal Life Insurance Co. Ltd. and Godrej Industries Limited as an Independent Director. She works for Sandoz Private Limited as Global Competency Centre & Country Chief Financial Officer with effect from May 2023. As CFO Global Competency Centre (GCC) she is responsible to drive the finance agenda of Sandoz GCCs located at Hyderabad, Prague & Mexico and as Country CFO she is responsible to build strong governance and finance community in India. Prior to joining Sandoz, she worked with Novartis, and in her last role was CFO of Novartis Global Service Centre, Hyderabad responsible for strong financial leadership and governance. She joined Novartis India Limited in 2010 and progressed through roles of increasing responsibilities in treasury, taxation, statutory audited accounts, M&A, and board governance. She was CFO of Novartis India Limited from October, 2013 to June, 2019 responsible for providing the Board and Audit Committee with guidance relating to finance and corporate governance, investor relations along with compliance to the Companies Act, Listing Agreement etc. She has been on the Board of Novartis India Limited as Whole-Time Director from June, 2016 to May, 2019 and as Non-Executive Director from June, 2019 to November, 2022. Monaz has also worked with Cadbury India Limited where she was the Company Secretary and held various responsibilities in treasury, tax, integrated portfolio management, board governance, investor relations, financial planning and international business development. Monaz started her career with Godrej Soaps Limited as management trainee where she worked in different capacities in the finance function. Throughout her career, she has led various M&A and legal entity structuring assignments, which has given her rich experience on the perspectives of regulators, management, and investors. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce Degree and Master of Management Studies with specialization in Finance from Mumbai University, India. She is also an Associate Member of The Institute of Company Secretaries of India and The Institute of Cost Accountants of India.

As an early investor in InMobi and InfoEdge two of India's billion dollar technology companies, Sandeep Murthy is one of the builders of India's Internet economy. He hasn't just seen the highs and lows play out as an investor, but actually roughed it out in operational roles including one as the CEO of Cleartrip in 2006 for three years. A dreamer from the start, who doesn’t believe in choosing between “this or that” he did his undergrad in both business and engineering from the University of Pennsylvania. Like all good Penn grads he dove into investment banking. However, since it was the height of the dot.com boom, he did it a little differently by moving out to Palo Alto, California to join CSFB Technology Group. He teamed up with a friend to build a digital music company that was incubated by Sony Music and ended up selling the company to Sony after the Internet bubble burst. Sandeep lived the Bay Area dream for a few years before moving to New York to join InterActive Corp (IAC) the owners of Expedia, TicketMaster and Home Shopping Network where he helped launch Gifts.com. He started to explore the India technology opportunity and ultimately moved to Mumbai to manage investments for Sherpalo Ventures, a fund based out of Menlo Park in California.

Today he's a co-founder and partner at Lightbox, a Mumbaibased venture capital firm investing in Indian consumer technology companies. Lightbox has raised over $380M from leading institutional investors. Recent investments include Droom, Rebel Foods, Furlenco and AI-platform Embibe, which received a $185MM investment commitment from Reliance, India's internet super power. This is the largest AI investment in edtech anywhere in the world. Sandeep also supports platforms like Magic Bus, a non-profit organization that uses activity based curriculum to teach underprivileged kids life skills. Most of his time is spent figuring how to make something unprecedented happen. With an all-in, nothing-held-back style, he loves diving in, getting to the heart of the matter, trying new things and getting as many people as possible involved. In a somewhat unpredictable market, Sandeep’s investment success stems from a combination of deep product instinct and unconventional thinking.

Ajay Vaghani is the Founder Chairman and Managing Director, of Hamilton Housewares. Hamilton was established in 2000 and over the past eighteen years, Hamilton has pioneered products in the Houseware, Kitchenware & Tableware space and MILTON has become a highly recognized brand in India. Over the years ‘CLARO’, ‘TREO’ and ‘SPOTZERO’ have also carved a niche for themselves. With four manufacturing locations and more than 6,000 products, Hamilton is present across India and over the past few years has seen tremendous growth in all areas.

Ajay is an innovator and enjoys working with technology. He has been instrumental in launching more than 6,000 products over the past eighteen years. Through his leadership, the company has grown at a 20% CAGR over the past 5 years. Ajay has served in Young President Organization as a Board Member in Mumbai and South East Asia. He also served as an advisor to a USA based private equity firm. Currently, he is a member of the President’s Council in Wesleyan University, U.S.A.