Arushi AgarwalThe newest addition on the Fortune ’40 Under 40′ list of the most influential people in the world are the Ambani twins, Isha Ambani, and Akash Ambani. Both the Ambanis appeared together under the category of technology in this year’s list.
Akash Ambani joined Reliance Industries in 2014 after he completed his degree in Economics from Brown University. In 2015, Isha Ambani also joined the company following stints at Yale, Stanford, and McKinsey. Since then they have been training to take over their father, Mukesh Ambani’s company when his term will come to an end.
Fortune mentioned, “As Jio board members, they helped seal the company’s recent megadeal with Facebook — USD 5.7 billion for a 9.99% stake — plus major follow-on investments from marquee tech titans like Google, Qualcomm, and Intel. The flurry of investments lent the business an eye-popping USD 65 billion private valuation.” They had a role to play in the launch of JioMart as well. JioMart is a venture that is aimed at taking over Amazon and Flipkart to become India’s largest online shopping market.
Fortune also mentioned the glamorous lives of the brother and sister. They don’t just train and work hard for the company. They have also been seen partying with their friends Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas and attending private concerts of Beyonce.
Along with the Ambani twins, Mr. Byju Raveendran, founder of India’s biggest education app Byju’s made his debut on this prestigious list as well. Since 2011, this educational start-up has transformed the scene of online education in India and now holds a market value of more than $10 billion.
Mr. Byju is looking at expanding his company to the US and the UK as well. Last month, he was able to buy WhiteHat Jr, an educational start-up for $300 million.
Managing director of Xiaomi India, Mr. Manu Kumar Jain also appeared on this list. Fortune said, “Mr. Jain knew nothing about smartphones when Chinese giant Xiaomi tapped him in 2014 to build its India operations from the ground up. But he did know a thing or two about startups.”
Ever since Mr. Jain took over, Xiaomi had many successes like for instance it was able to overtake Samsung, an established smartphones leader in India in the span of just 3 years.