India @100: The Next Frontier for Business, Innovation, and Investment

Deepak has a professional career of over three decades with the World Bank, Citibank, and Private Equity and has held responsibilities across  Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia.

In 2015 he was appointed the Managing Director and CEO to establish INVEST INDIA, as The National Investment Promotion Agency of the Government and during his eight year tenure (March 2023) the Agency has been acknowledged as the World’s most awarded IPA.  

Invest India is the point of reference for Investors and also assists several important initiatives of the Government including, Startup India, One District One Product, The Prime Minister’s Science and Technology initiative and the digitisation of the processes and approvals during the investor journey.  

He has been a member of several High Level Government Committees including Committee on Financing infrastructure, Core Group on Corporate Governance for Independent Directors, Committees on Fintech, Innovation, Tourism, Healthcare, and a special invitee to the Prime Minister’s Science, Technology and Innovation Advisory Council. 

He has also been a member and special invitee on the official bilateral CEO Forums with, USA, UK, Canada, Brazil, Australia, France, Japan, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, Spain, Thailand, Republic of Korea, Israel, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Qatar and UAE.

Mr Bagla was on the Investment Committee of the Government’s US$ 1.5 Billion ‘Fund of Funds’ for Startups and is on the Advisory Board of the Government’s US$ 7 billion ‘Fund of Funds’ for MSMEs.

He has a Bachelor’s degree with Honours in Economics from St Stephen’s College, Delhi University, and a dual Masters in International Diplomacy and International Trade and Finance, from the School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, Washington DC.

He is the elected President of the Geneva based, World Association of Investment Promotion Agencies (WAIPA).  WAIPA is the world’s single largest Investment platform with a membership of the National  IPAs of over 105 countries.

Mr Bagla was given the Special Jury Award for The Ernst and Young, “Entrepreneur of the Year 2023”.

He has been conferred, “Grande Ufficiale dell’Ordine della Stella d’Italia” (The Order of The Star of Italy)  by the President of the Republic of Italy.

Asha Jadeja Motwani is a Silicon Valley-based venture capitalist who has invested in over 200 technology startups in the Bay Area. As an entrepreneur herself, her investing philosophy is designed to ignite young entrepreneurs into becoming disruptive change makers. “Making a dent in poverty requires money. Without a strong focus on economic growth, developing countries like India will continue to be stuck in a cycle of poverty. The need of the hour is to let technology-driven growth enable India to break out of the cycle of poverty. It is critical that we identify and remove legacy obstacles to growth as fast as possible.” All of Asha’s venture and philanthropic initiatives in India have been designed to help the nation break free of this cycle of poverty. “Exponential growth is possible through technology-enabled entrepreneurship, lean government, world-class education, and women’s leadership.” Gender equality, inclusive growth, lean government, and national security are core interests of MITLI (Motwani Institute for Thought Leadership in Innovation) – an unprecedented bridge between the US and India. Asha created MITLI as an advocacy platform designed to drive policy changes in India. A firm believer in the power of grassroots socio-economic movements Asha created MakerFest in 2013. A powerful network of makers and innovators that pro-actively problem-solve for their own communities. Makerfest is now prolific in Africa, India, and more recently in Brazil. She created India’s first network of dozens of Fablabs designed to spark a just in a time manufacturing environment in India. With help from Prof Sugata Mitra, Asha also set up India’s first self-supported School in the Cloud in Ahmedabad. This has now grown to over 60 locally managed and sustained “schools in the cloud” within South Asia. Asha is a prolific thought leader rooted within the milieus of Stanford, UC Berkeley, Google, Hoover Institute, Council on Foreign Relations, and Brookings USA. She is a limited partner in over 20 Bay Area venture funds, Acumen Fund NY, and Kawasafi Fund, Africa. As a prolific collector of Indian art, Asha is currently engaged with Stanford University Cantor Art Museum in bringing top Indian artists into a global forefront.