Biocon Chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw Visits KGI

April 22, 2016

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, chairperson and managing director of Biocon, Asia’s leading biopharmaceuticals enterprise recently visited KGI. The visit provided an opportunity for KGI faculty, staff, and students to meet Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw and to better understand the Biocon Academy partnership established with KGI in 2014.

One of the day’s highlights was a small lunchtime chat session in which KGI students had the opportunity sit with Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw and engage with her directly in a Q & A format. During this gathering she discussed her journey as it related to her career and explained how she approached and overcame the many obstacles she faced as she grew the biotech industry in India. Of the many valuable insights she provided, students were most interested in what skills she thought a successful entrepreneur should have.

PPM student, Mihali Pandya, was among the small group of students who attended the lunch. Pandya explained she had known about Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw since she herself was a young girl and was extremely excited and honored to have attended the lunch. “Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw leads the path of successful entrepreneurial endeavors. Being able to sit with a group of fellow students and ask her questions–and hear her profound answers was a great opportunity I will never forget.”

Biocon Academy Program Director Meghana Joshi, PhD also offered her thoughts on the visit. “We were very glad Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw came to visit our KGI campus in Claremont, California. Not only is she a great thought leader and a role model for students but she also provided them with advice on how to develop their careers.”

Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw was also in the area to accept the USC Viterbi Global Leadership in Engineering Award.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw a pioneering biotech entrepreneur, is the chairperson and managing director of Biocon, Asia’s leading biopharmaceuticals enterprise. Named among TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world, she is recognized as a global thought leader for the biotechnology industry. Under her stewardship, Biocon has evolved since its inception in 1978 from an industrial enzymes company to a fully-integrated, innovation-led, emerging global biopharmaceutical enterprise committed to reduce therapy costs of chronic conditions like diabetes, cancer and autoimmune diseases.

As a global influencer, she is ranked among, ‘World’s 25 Most Influential People in Biopharma’, by Fierce Biotech, Forbes ‘100 Most Powerful Women’, and Fortune’s ‘Top 25 Most Powerful Women in Asia-Pacific.’ The US-based Chemical Heritage Foundation conferred her with the ‘2014 Othmer Gold Medal’ and Germany-based Kiel Institute for the World Economy awarded her its coveted ‘2014 Global Economy Prize’ for Business. The US-based, Foreign Policy magazine has named her among the ‘100 Leading Global Thinkers of 2014.’ More recently, she was featured in ‘The Worldview 100 List’ of the most influential visionaries, by US-based Scientific American magazine and has been ranked second among the 100 Most Influential People in the field of medicine in the ‘Global Medicine Maker Power List 2015’ published by a top UK-based medical publication.

A first generation entrepreneur with more than 39 years of experience, she is recognized for leading the biotech revolution in India. Her contribution to the biotechnology industry in India has been recognized with the Padma Shri (1989) and the Padma Bhushan (2005), two of India’s very prestigious civilian honors.