Horizons 2023

Arushi Goel is a specialist for data policy and blockchain at World Economic Forum Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution India. She leads work on strategic and governance issues relating to data sharing through data exchanges and technology policy for blockchain and digital assets to drive innovation and sustainable development, in collaboration with international organization, government and industry stakeholders. With a background in law, she earlier served as a Judge in India. Prior to joining the Forum, she was a legal advisor to emerging technology companies in India and Middle East.

Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer, Alstom

Danny Di Perna is the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Alstom and was appointed to this role in February 2021. In this role, he has the group responsibility and oversight for Alstom’s global supply chain and operations, including the company’s platform product strategy. In addition, the role includes the leadership of the Rolling Stock & Component product line.

Mr. Di Perna joined Alstom in 2021 as part of the acquisition by Alstom of the rail division of Bombardier, for which he was President of Bombardier Transportation since February 2019. He joined Bombardier in 2018 as the President of Aerostructures and Engineering Services. In this role, he was responsible for leading the transformation and growth strategy for this business unit.

He has more than 30 years of aerospace and industrial experience. Mr. Di Perna began his career at Pratt & Whitney Canada, where he held positions of increasing responsibility within engineering, marketing, manufacturing, supply chain and operations.

Before joining Bombardier, he served as Vice President, Global Sourcing at GE Power. In this role, he oversaw strategic sourcing, procurement and supplier quality. Prior to that, he held several senior leadership positions within United Technologies Corporation (UTC), where he worked for 24 years. Mr. Di Perna was notably Senior Vice President, Operations of the Pratt & Whitney Division during the production readiness phase of the PurePower® family of engines and led the Auxiliary Power business for the Hamilton Sundstrand Division in San Diego, California. In addition, he also served as Senior Vice President of Aircraft and Engine Maintenance from 2007 to 2009 for Air Canada Technical Services (ACTS).

Mr. Di Perna earned a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Concordia University and a Master of Business Administration from McGill University.

An engineer by training, Karthik is a Fellow and Director, Research Coordination, at The Council. As Director, he has a bird’s eye view of CEEW’s ongoing and planned research and ensures cross-team coherence for CEEW’s research direction and imperatives. He also dons the hat of an internal adviser across research teams, creates institutional platforms that spur innovation and, in partnership with other senior researchers, continues to strengthen CEEW’s foundation for world-class research.

He has played a pivotal role in conceptualising and executing some of CEEW’s biggest successes and collaborative efforts such as the ACCESS and IRES surveys and the associated studies, the GHG Platform Initiative and the first full fledged office programme office based out of Lucknow. He continues to be an active researcher with the power sector and air pollution work programmes.

Karthik holds a Masters degree in Public Policy from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. He also holds an undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering and an M.Tech in Infrastructure Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.

Purushottam Kaushik (Puru) joined World Economic Forum in March 2020 and has twenty five years of experience in Telecom and IT in sales leadership and management consulting roles before joining Forum.

He has a BE in Production Engineering from Punjab Engineering College, Chandigarh, India, and an MBA from Faculty of Management Studies, BHU, Varanasi. Puru started his career in 1995 and has worked in various Telecom companies including Alcatel Systems, Lucent Technologies, and Nortel Network till 2009 in sales leadership roles.

From 2009 to 2016, he was at Cisco systems, India and performed as Managing Director Sales from 2014-16. He was head of Telecom business (2011-2014) and Head of Services business (2009-2011). Subsequently he has worked as Senior Advisor-McKinsey from Dec 2016 to June 2018 and in April 2018, he joined as Head – Strategy and Mega Business for Larsen and Toubro Ltd.

He is also Board of Director for Bhopal Smart City and on has been Board of Governors for Punjab Engineering College (Deemed University) from 2017-2020.

Raimund Klein is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the International Centre for Industrial Transformation (INCIT), an independent environmental, social and governance (ESG) institution which champions manufacturing transformation globally and advocates the rise of smart manufacturing.

With close to 40 years of experience  in business strategy, business planning, sales, business development, marketing strategy and operation development and more, Raimund is a staunch advocate for the digitalisation of manufacturing, firmly believing that digital transformation is a must for future success. In his current role, Raimund actively fosters collaboration between public and private sector manufacturing-related organisations to catalyse industrial transformation across geographies and industries.

He also provides direction and guidance for the development and deployment of globally referenced frameworks, tools, concepts and programmes for the international manufacturing community. This enables INCIT to raise awareness about the latest transformation developments and manufacturing trends, provide benchmarks that are international, publicly available and quantitative, and facilitate the sharing of learning points, challenges and best practices for manufacturing transformation.

Under Raimund’s leadership, INCIT has officially partnered with Saudi Arabia’s National Industrial Development and Logistics Program (NIDLP) to foster and accelerate Industry 4.0 transformation across the Kingdom through the adoption of the Smart Industry Readiness Index, or SIRI, across Saudi Arabia. INCIT has also recently signed an agreement to collaborate with the Philippine Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to accelerate the transformation of the manufacturing sector in the Philippines.

Previously, Raimund was Head of Digital Industries ASEAN at Siemens and was accountable for developing new business models for digitalisation and automation.

Raimund speaks actively about a range of manufacturing-related topics including productivity, Industry 4.0, sustainability, smart manufacturing, and manufacturing transformation. In 2022, he spoke with APAC Network about how manufacturing is playing its part to address the climate challenge.

Dr Rajiv Kumar is the Chairman of Pahle India Foundation, a non-profit making research think tank.   He is the former Vice Chairman of NITI Aayog.  He is currently Member Global Leadership Council, GASP, New York.  He is also a Director on Parley India Foundation. He also serves as the Chancellor of Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune and Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Giri Institute of Development Studies, Lucknow.

He has wide experience of having worked in academia, government, industry as well as in multilateral institutions.  He started his academic career in Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) as a Researcher during 1977-1982.  He later became the Director & CEO of ICRIER between 2006 and 2011.  He was a Professor at the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT) and a Senior Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research(CPR), Delhi.

In the government, he was Economic Advisor with Department of Economic Affairs (DEA), Ministry of Finance (1991-1995) and Senior Consultant at the Bureau of Industrial Costs and Prices(BICP), Ministry of Industry (1989-1991).

His experience in the multilateral financial institutions was with Asian Development Bank(ADB), Manila, where he spent 10 years before returning to India in 2004.  He was also the Chief Economist of the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) during 2004-2006 and Secretary General of Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) during 2011-2013.  He served on the Central Boards of State Bank of India for two terms and was also on the Central Board of Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

Dr. Kumar has a Ph.D in Ecnomics from Lucknow University and a D.Phil from Oxford University.

R “Ray” Wang is the Principal Analyst and Founder of Constellation Research; and the author of the popular business strategy and technology blog – “A Software Insider’s Point of View”. With viewership in the 10’s of millions of page-views a year, his blog provides insights into how disruptive technologies and new business models impact the enterprise.

A prolific keynote speaker, research analyst, and author, Ray advises buy-side clients on innovation, business model design, engagement strategies, and emerging tech. His Silicon Valley research firm – Constellation Research, advises CEOs, CIOs, CDOs, CMOs and Board of Directors across Global 2000 companies, on future business strategy, disruptive technologies supporting new business models, and vendor selection. He also helps Technology & IT Services firms with insights into buy-side trends, their go-to-market strategy, and new engagement & monetization models.

Ray’s first book, Disrupting Digital Business, is published by Harvard Business Review Press, and his second book, Everybody Wants To Rule The World, is Published by Harper Collins Leadership. The new book is a handy guide equipped with strategies that executives should leverage to thrive in an era of digital giants such as Google, Facebook, and Amazon.

Ray’s previous stints include executive roles in product, marketing, strategy, and consulting areas at Forrester, Oracle, Deloitte, Ernst & Young Johns Hopkins Hospital. He is also a regular contributor to Harvard Business Review; is an expert commentator for CNBC, Fox Business and other global business news channels; and is frequently quoted in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Bloomberg, Reuters, IDG News Service, Economic Times, Mint, and other global media outlets.

As a Technology Leader at Microsoft, Sandeep Alur heads ‘Microsoft Technology Center’, an Experience Center focusing on helping Customers accelerate their digital transformation journey. Being a passionate techie, and an evangelist at heart, he loves technologies that have a profound impact on human lives. A ‘Thought Leader’, a ‘Trusted Adviser’ and a meticulous implementer on the ground, he believes that the next big leap is in ‘Data Science’, and the power of ‘Generative AI’ will elevate Customer Experience to greater heights. Sandeep holds a Bachelor’s degree in ‘Mechanical Engineering’ from RVCE, and a Post Graduate degree in ‘Data Science and AI’ from ISB, Hyderabad.

A career civil servant for about 4 decades. Held positions at the national level including Secretary, Electronics and IT of the Federal Government of India and Chairman of Unique ID Authority of India (Aadhaar) – the largest biometric ID system in the world with over 1.3 billion digital identities issued. A thought leader in the areas of Digital Transformation and Digital Ecosystem Architecture. Implemented over 20 large transformation projects in India.

As Chief Advisor of C4IR India since 2020, he is associated with its initiatives in policy design and deployment of emerging technologies in health, agriculture, and education sectors.

After 27 years of digital excellence at Mercedes-Benz, Dr. Siegmar Haasis set up his own company, HaasisDEC – Digital Engineering Consulting, in mid-2021. With the approach of value-based digital transformation, he acts on the one hand as a C-level advisor for digital transformation projects at automotive manufacturers and their suppliers and on the other hand as a go-to-market enabler/guide for software, IT, tech companies and startups.

Dr. Haasis completed his doctorate on the topic of knowledge-based design systems after a toolmaker apprenticeship, mechanical engineering and computer science studies.

In 1995, he joined Daimler AG via the international junior research group.

International project assignments in R&D were followed by positions in production in Untertuerkheim, research in Ulm and Berlin, development in Sindelfingen and IT in Boeblingen. From 2010-2013, he was CIO Asia/China/Overseas at the Singapore and Beijing sites. From 2013-2021, as CIO R&D Mercedes-Benz, he assumed international responsibility for digitalization in vehicle development.

Highlights of his successfully implemented strategies and projects in the field of digitalization in engineering included: Digital Twin in Vehicle Development, Production and Sales, Digital Prototype and CAE Integration, Systems Engineering, VR/AR Integration and Data Continuity, Software Development and Documentation in the Vehicle as well as Cloud-based Engineering Data Platforms. The basis of digitization has always been value generation.

During the last 15 years, he has been involved in the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA) in product lifecycle management and was most recently chairman of the working group on digitalization in product development.