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Meet the Indian-American Fortune 500 CEOs

India Abroad - September 15, 2006
India Abroad / rediff.com Inc. © 2006

Excerpts from article - the full text is in
copies of India Abroad on the newsstand.

Meet the three Indian American CEOs who preceded
Indra Nooyi in the elite Fortune 500 Club

Ramani Ayer (BTech '69 ChE)
Designation: Chairman, President and CEO,
Hartford Financial Services Group
Company Ranking as per 2006 Fortune 500 List: 78
Revenues in 2005 (in million): $27,083

Born in Kerala on May 27, 1947, Ayer has a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (Class of 1969). A business biography mentions how he could "barely afford materials for his classes" since his father was a poorly paid government official. So he arranged to share a friend’s books. "For five years," the biography notes, "Ayer arranged his schedule so that he could study at night." After a night of studying Ayer would slip the books under his friend’s door for the latter to study. The hard work paid off, enabling Ayer to get admission to Drexel University in Philadelphia where he obtained an MS in 1971 and PhD two years later. The same year, 1973, he joined the Hartford Financial Services Group. His appointment as chairman and chief executive officer came on February 1, 1997. Under Ayer’s direction, the company’s worldwide property-casualty operations have grown substantially. Its North American operations are the eighth largest in the United States with revenues of more than $6.3 billion. In November 2002, as recognition of his role in championing educational activities in the community, the Urban League of Greater Hartford awarded him its highest honor, the Founder’s Award. This October 13, Leadership Greater Hartford will confer on him its Polaris Award, again in recognition of his contribution to education in the Connecticut community. He is married to Louise Ayer and they have two children.

Rajiv L Gupta (BTech '67 ME)
Designation: Chairman, Director and CEO,
Rohm & Haas
Company Ranking as per 2006 Fortune 500 List: 286
Revenues in 2005 (in million): $7,994

Unlike Ramani Ayer, who is a naturalized American, Raj Gupta retains his Indian nationality. Like Ayer, he is an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology and holds a BS degree in mechanical engineering (Class of 1967). He too went to Drexel and secured an MBA in finance (1971), after securing a MS degree in operations research from Cornell (1969). Born in Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh on December 23, 1945, he joined Rohm and Haas in 1971 as a financial analyst. He held positions of increasing responsibility during the next two decades. Eariy in 1996, he became one of the six members of the chairman’s committee and given oversight responsibility for the company’s electronic materials business group. In December 1998, he was elected to the board of directors and named vice chairman in January 1999. In October that year, he was appointed chairman and chief executive officer. Last year, he assumed the additional title of president. According to one account, he is credited with increasing the company’s R&D growth from 11% in 1997 to 35% in 2003 as well as setting a long-term sales growth of 4% to 6% "to be achieved through new product development, expanded presence in Asia," among other ways and means. Married to the former Kamal Varshney, the couple has two daughters, one of who is lawyer Vanita Gupta, winner of the India Abroad Publisher’s Award 2004.

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