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people, to mention just a few. visionary of our times, India is lucky to
Agarwal has consistently used his have not lost him to foreign shores.
powerful influence to serve the greater
good of the country. 21 Dr Cyrus Poonawalla, 83, Industrialist
We said it last time and we’ll say it again: Dr Cyrus S Poonawalla is
What was that saying? When you give, Chairman and Managing
you receive 10-fold… Director of the Cyrus
Poonawalla Group,
20 Nandan Nilekani, 68, Entrepreneur which includes the
Long before Aadhaar, Serum Institute of India
Nilekani, who was (SII), the largest vaccine manufacturer in
then Co-founder, CEO, the world and Poonawalla Fincorp, a keen
president and managing player in the financial space in India.
director of Infosys, was In October 2024, Poonawalla and his
selling a vision of India family were ranked ninth on Forbes list
to the world that today is much more of India’s 100 richest tycoons, with a net
apparent to many. worth of $24.5 billion.
With the AI revolution in full throttle, Last year, Poonawalla was the recipient
Nandan Nilekani’s opinion is that all of the Lifetime Achievement Award at the
AI should be use-case-led which can be CNBC TV18 India Business Leader Awards
amplified to make the lives of common (IBLA). He was honoured with the Padma
people better. Bhushan in 2022 for his lifetime of work in
How do you ensure that AI benefits a the biotech space.
country where nearly one in four people Some of the recent achievements of SII
are illiterate? This is the kind of question include R21/Matrix-M Malaria Vaccine,
being asked by Adbhut India, Nilekani’s collaboration with University of Oxford:
latest project. SII is working with the university
“India’s digital transformation began to develop a chimeric protein-based
with Aadhaar,” he told Time magazine. vaccine for Men-B disease. Together with
“Clearly, [AI] will lead to productivity Univercells, SII is partnering with the
improvement and automation, including Belgian biotech innovator to increase access
in the area of customer service.” That to personalised cancer care. SII is working
boost in productivity, Nilekani thinks, will with ImmunityBio to manufacture BCG on
eventually outweigh job losses within the a large scale.
sector. “We reach more children than Coca-Cola
Nandan has co-founded and is the and PepsiCo can ever hope to,” he has
Chairman of EkStep, a not-for-profit effort famously said. We doff our hat to you, Dr
to create a learner centric, technology- Poonawalla.
based platform to improve basic literacy
and numeracy for millions of children. 22 Uday Shankar, 63, Media Baron
An author of bestselling books, Nilekani’s An Indian media executive and former
voice is much respected across the nation journalist, in 2024, Uday Shankar was
on business and social issues. A true appointed Vice Chairman of JioStar, a
SENIORS TODAY | ISSUE #67 | JANUARY 2025 15
