She is rich in not just wealth, but in the diversity of her interests and experiences that straddle spearheading an IT business, doing philanthropy, producing films and wildlife conservation.
To start with, Roshni Nadar Malhotra, the 40-year old chairperson of India’s third largest software firm HCL Technologies, and Trustee, Shiv Nadar Foundation whose net worth is ₹84,330 crore, according to Hurun-Kotak Private Bank’s Leading Wealthy Women report, wanted a career in media. Accordingly, the heiress to the IT services firm that Shiv Nadar commanded, studied radio, television and film, interning with CNN and working with in Sky News in London.
But her dad nudged her into business studies – she did her MBA in Social Enterprise Management from Kellogg, before throwing her into the deep end as CEO of HCL Corporation, the holding company of HCL Tech, in 2009, when she was just 28. Nadar Malhotra, however, learnt the ropes pretty fast and earned a board seat by 2013. In 2019, HCL announced, it would acquire selected select IBM products in a deal worth $1.8 billion, which pivoted the company from IT and solutions to embrace products and platforms. The challenge before Nadar Malhotra, who took over from her dad in 2020, is to ensure the scaling of those streams. A product portfolio transformation is currently underway at HCL, which like other IT Services firms grew on the back of demand for cloud transformation and application during the pandemic. However, the products and platforms business did not do so well.
Significantly, if Nadar Malhotra is the wealthiest businesswoman, HCL Technologies CEO and MD C Vijaykumar is the highest paid IT sector CEO with compensation of $16.52 million during the 2021-2022 financial year.
A major part of Nadar Malhotra’s time is devoted to the Shiv Nadar Foundation, under which the Shiv Nadar University, the Shiv Nadar Schools, VidyaGyan, Kiran Nadar Museum of Art) and some other initiatives – are run. Delivering quality education is a dream for the Nadars.
From her mother Kiran, she has inherited an eye for art. Given the gamut of her interests, there’s a wealth of opportunities that life holds for this multifaceted lady.
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