LEADERSHIP

Leadership

   Sreejith NN: Co-founder and Managing Director

Sreejith is focused on implementing and refining the supply chain model that is central to the success of ROPE. He establishes the distributive rural production centres and sets up management systems across them ensuring quality and timely delivery of the products. Sreejith has experience and success in organizing and working with the rural informal sector. He has managerial experience in sectors such as micro finance, rural enterprise promotion, start up incubation and entrepreneurship development. Sreejith holds Bachelor of Technology in mechanical engineering from Government Engineering College, Thrissur, and a Postgraduate Diploma in Development Management from Tata-Dhan Academy, Madurai.

   Patrick Fischer: Co-founder and Director

Patrick draws on his unique experience and knowledge of best practices in both the private sector and international development sector to provide key strategic inputs to ROPE. An Investor in ROPE himself he is actively helping ROPE in establishing its financial, technological and managerial systems. An engineer by training, Patrick started his career in the aerospace industry, working in several Asian countries. He then transitioned to international development, moving to Namibia where he helped manage a $20 million dollar program reaching 60,000 people. Patrick holds a BS and BA from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management. Patrick is passionate about the ROPE model and believes in its ability and potential to expand internationally creating large scale rural employment

   Dr. Aarti Kawlra: Director

Dr. Aarti is a social anthropologist with over 18 years of experience in teaching and consulting at prestigious institutions such as the National Institute of Fashion Technology, Chennai and the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. She currently teaches in the Department of Humanities in IIT Madras. Her keen interests are design and ICT based design communication. Dr. Aarti was instrumental in establishing ROPE and has served as a mentor to ROPE's entrepreneurial team from the beginning.

   Kunal R Sachdev: Director

Kunal is a nominee to the ROPE board by the National Research Development Corporation, an investor in ROPE. Kunal has more than two decades of experience in retail, marketing and communications. He is currently Managing Director at Caravan Craft Retail Pvt. Ltd. and Principal Founder, Navarac. Previously he was CEO of Hidesign, a leather accessories brand headquartered at Pondicherry, India, where he was instrumental in building the Hidesign brand and growing it internationally. Prior to Hidesign, Kunal was Head of Marketing for Retail Liability Products at ITC Classic Finance Pvt. Ltd. Kunal holds an MBA from Indian Institute of Planning and Management.

   Dr. Ashok Jhunjhunwala: Advisor

Prof. Ashok Jhunjhunwala is Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, and leads the Telecommunications and Computer Networks group (TeNeT) at IIT Madras. TeNeT group has incubated a number of technology companies to develop world class products for rural markets. He also chairs the Rural Technology and Business Incubator (RTBI) of IIT Madras. Dr. Jhunjhunwala is the recipient of many prestigious awards, including the Padma Shri. BusinessWeek Magazine named him one of India's 50 most powerful people. Dr. Jhunjhunwala sits on the boards of the State Bank of India, TTML, BEL, Polaris, 3i Infotech, Sasken, Tejas, NRDC and IDRBT. He is a member of Prime Minister’s Scientific Advisory Committee.

   Paul Basil: Advisor

Mr. Paul Basil is Founder and CEO of Villgro Innovations Foundation which identifies, grooms and markets innovations that have rural benefits. Paul and Villgro co-founded the Lemelson Recognition and Mentoring Programme (L-RAMP) with IIT Madras. Villgro has so far identified and activated close to 1500 social innovators, impacted more than 350,000 rural users and created social returns worth USD 5 million. Paul is an Ashok fellow and holds a B Tech degree in mechanical engineering and a post-graduate management degree from Indian Institute of Forest Management, Bhopal.