1. Born on July 29, 1904, this gentleman was the founder of several industries such as Tata Consultancy Services, Tata Motors, Titan and Tata Tea. He was inspired by French aviator Louis Blériot to take to the skies and in 1929 became the first licensed pilot in India. He eventually went on to form what will later become Air India. He was also responsible for founding the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and Asia’s first Cancer Hospital. Named after the Mughal Emperor whose name meant ‘world-conqueror’, who was this enterprising businessman?
2. Om Prakash Munjal was a Punjabi businessman who started a bicycle spare parts business in Amritsar in 1944 with his brothers. After the Partition, they moved to Ludhiana where they took a ₹50,000 loan and started the first bicycle manufacturing unit in India, producing 639 bicycles in the first year. By 1980, it had become the largest bicycle manufacturer in the world and currently produces close to 20,000 cycles a day. The group also expanded to motorbikes and went on to have a successful partnership with Honda for the same. What company is this that makes some of India’s most popular two wheelers?
3. This Chennai-born lady is consistently ranked by Forbes as one of the most powerful women in the world. Having completed her masters in Yale she joined the Boston Consulting Group and then eventually in 1994 joined the company where she would rise to become only the fifth CEO in the five-decade history of the company. In 2018 she was invited to become the first ever independent female director of the International Cricket Council. Who is this lady and of which company is she CEO?
4. Sindhuja Rajaraman took over as CEO of Seppan Entertainment Pvt. Ltd., a Chennai-based animation company in 2011. She is also brand ambassador for Corel, a software used for animation. Sindhuja is an expert at 2D and 3D cartoon animations and her stint at Seppan led to a Guiness World Record in India. What record does Sindhuja hold?
5. Padma Shri Rakesh Bakshi is an Indian climate change activist and a pioneer in the field of non-conventional energy. He is the founder of multiple companies in the field of researching and manufacturing renewable energy generation equipment. Due to him being an entrepreneur in environment-friendly technology, what fitting portmanteau word is used to describe him?
6. Mallika Srinivasan was born in Tirunelveli in 1959 and studied at WCC and the Madras University. She joined the company her grandfather had established in the mid-80s and eventually became CEO in 2011. The company is the world’s third-largest manufacturer of a certain product, which is featured in the name. She currently has dealers all around the world contributing to agriculture globally. What company is this?
7. Ajaypal Singh Banga was born in Pune and started his career at Nestlé. He eventually joined this multinational financial service corporation of which he became CEO in 2010. He is the chairman of the US-India Business Council and advised President Obama on Trade Policy. Which company is this whose ‘Priceless’ campaign is renowned for its funny ads?
8. Shantanu Narayen from Hyderabad started his career at Apple and then founded ‘Pictra’ which was a pioneer of digital photo sharing over the Internet. He then joined this computer software company in 1998 where he eventually became CEO in 2007. This company is the leader in multimedia and creativity software products. Their most extensively used product is the ‘Portable Document Format’. Which company is this and how better do we know this format?
9. P. Ayya Nadar and his cousin Shanmuga Nadar travelled to Kolkata in 1922 and learnt about the match industry. They returned to their hometown and set up the first safety matches factory in the area. They eventually diversified into fireworks and soon, thanks to dry and arid conditions of the place, the firework industry boomed. Which place was this that Ayya Nadar transformed into one of the largest producers of fireworks in the world?
10. This Madurai-born gentleman grew up in Chennai and started his career in Applied Materials. In 2004 he joined one of the fastest growing technology companies and led the product management and innovation team. He was instrumental in developing the company’s file storage and synchronisation service called ‘Drive’. In 2015 he took over as CEO of the holding company which had just been formed. He had also been a contender for CEO which went eventually to another Indian, Satya Nadella. Who is this gentleman and what company is this?
Answers
1. Jehangir Ratanji Dadabhoy Tata, ‘J.R.D. Tata’
2. Hero
3. Indra Nooyi, PepsiCo
4. Youngest CEO in India. She was 14 years old.
5. Eco-preneur
6. TAFE — Tractor And Farm Equipment
7. Mastercard
8. Adobe, PDF
9. Sivakasi
10. Sundar Pichai, Google (Alphabet Inc.)
A molecular biologist from Madurai, our quizmaster enjoys trivia and music, and is working on a rock ballad called ‘Coffee is a Drink, Kaapi is an Emotion’. @bertyashley