Women Innovators in the Emergent Era

Beth Comstock’s mission is to understand what’s next, navigate change and help others do the same. By cultivating a habit of seeking out new ideas, people and places, she built a career path from storyteller to chief marketer to corporate Vice Chair. Beth spent nearly three decades at GE until December 2017. As Vice Chair of Innovation and previously Chief Marketing Officer, she led effored Media at NBC Universal, Beth oversaw TV ad revenue and new digital efforts, including the early development of hulu.com. Beth is a director at Nike, trustee of The National Geographic Society and former board president of the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian National Design Museum. She graduated from the College of William and Mary with a degree in biology. Her first book, Imagine it Forward, about working (and living) on the front lines of change, was released September 2018. Written about extensively in the media from the New York Times to Fortune, Fast Company and Vanity Fair, she has been named to the Fortune and Forbes lists of the world’s most powerful women, and is a Linked In Top 10 Influencer.

Brinda Miller studied Textile Design at Sir J.J. School of Art in 1979 with a First Class standing first in order of merit in Maharashtra. She also studied Drawing and Painting at the Parsons School of Design, New York in 1989. Brinda has been part of several group shows and has participated and organized several workshops and art camps in India as well as internationally. Brinda has been with the Kala Ghoda Association almost since its inception since 2000 as Hon. Executive Committee member and is involved in the beautification of this now famous art district of Mumbai, which hosts the only major multicultural festival in India. She is Hon. Festival Director of the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival and has been instrumental in bringing this festival to its present popularity. She is also Art Adviser to several NGOs and other Art Organizations such as Artists' Centre (of which she has been Hon. Chairperson for the last 3 years)and AVID, a public programming platform by Essar group. She is also on the Board of The Swiss Annual Award for Sir J.J School of Arts among many other juries. Brinda lives and works in Mumbai and is married to Architect Alfaz Miller. She is Director, ABM Architects Pvt Ltd., Mumbai

Gauri Devidayal is a law graduate from University College London and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants England & Wales. She pursued her career as a tax consultant with PricewaterhouseCoopers in London and Mumbai for 8 years. In early 2008, she met her husband, Jay Yousuf and was persuaded to leave the tax profession and to join him on his restaurant adventure. With no previous experience of the hospitality industry and having never dreamt of doing anything entrepreneurial, Gauri nevertheless supported Jay in creating The Table, a restaurant in South Mumbai, which has gone on to win many accolades and much recognition in the city as well as internationally. While planning the restaurant’s popular wine list, Gauri was encouraged to take on the WSET course and completed her Level III with a flying distinction. She has also been at the forefront of the farm to table initiative for the restaurant by setting up The Table Farm in Alibag, from where the restaurant gets much of its fresh produce. Gauri has also co-founded Magazine St. Kitchen, a culinary playground for intimate dinners, cooking workshops and more, housed in a restored heritage structure, in Byculla - a space that has already created an unparalleled buzz within the food community. The Kitchen is also the base for the wholesale and retail bakery – Mag St. Bread Co and the group’s catering arm, Dining Table. Most recently, Gauri partnered with the team from Neighbourhood Hospitality (Woodside Inn, The Pantry & Bombay Vintage) to open Miss T, a South East Asian restaurant and cocktail lounge in Colaba. Gauri was recently listed in GQ’s list of the 50 Most Influential Young Indians as well as BlackBook’s Top 50 Women in Indian Luxury, and is the only woman on the Managing Committee of the National Restaurant Association of India.

Nishtha Satyam was appointed as the Deputy Country Representative for UN Women, the entity of the United Nations that is dedicated to working towards Gender Equality and Woman's Empowerment, in India in January 2018. She is the youngest Deputy Country Rep for the Entity of the UN across 193 countries. She formerly managed Strategic Partnerships, Policy Impact and Public Relations for the UN Women Multi Country Office for India, Bhutan, Maldives and Sri Lanka. Nishtha has also served as the Private Sector Partnerships Specialist with the Office of the Resident Coordinator of the United Nations and UNDP. Prior to her career with the UN, Nishtha worked with leading firms such as KPMG and American Express as an Economist. As a futurist and feminist, she is an advocate of the urgency to mainstream women across the marketplace, workplace and community. Nishtha has authored a number of studies on the business value of inclusion and continues to be excited about using her multi-sectoral experience to inform the interplay of policy, politics and people to foster lasting change for the most marginalized. Nishtha holds a Master's Degree in International Business from the University of Nottingham, UK and a Bachelors in Economics from Delhi University.

Sandip Sen is currently President- Emerging Businesses for the global Indian conglomerate, The Essar Group as well as CEO of Litmus World, a well-known SAAS startup company, along with being the Lead Director of the management Consultancy firm COPC Inc. Sandip founded Customer First Services, one of India’s pioneering CRM companies. In 2006, Customer First Services was acquired by Aegis. Sandip was the Global CEO of Aegis from 2012-2018. Sandip has contributed exponentially to the Aegis growth story: as a market maker and brand builder and has been instrumental in building the company’s global business across countries like India, the US, South Africa, Australia, Philippines, and the UK. From less than USD 60 million revenues, his strategic insights and execution capabilities helped architect Aegis into a USD 1 billion company with over 55,000 employees across 13 countries. Sandip’s vision and strategy led to Gartner and IDC to include Aegis amongst the top Service Providers worldwide. Under his leadership Aegis won numerous prestigious awards including the Best Indian Company in the US. Sandip played a pivotal role in the extremely successful sale of Aegis USA Inc. to Teleperformance and later on Aegis Ltd to a private equity company, Capital Square Partners. Additionally, Sandip is a well-known writer, speaker and thought leader. He writes regularly for Business Newspapers and has been expansively quoted and featured by the global media fraternity. Sandip is an Honours Graduate in Economics from Presidency College Kolkata, as well as an MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur, India. In 2017, Sandip was awarded the prestigious Distinguished Alumni Award by XLRI.