Excellence at Certain Age: 7 Indian American Women Among Forbes ‘50 Over 50’

Seven Indian American women are among Forbes ‘50 Over 50,’ an annual list of 200 entrepreneurs, investors, creators, and entertainers who prove everyday that “age has no limit.”

Listed in the Impact section is Manjusha Kulkarni, co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, the nation’s leading aggregator of COVID-19-related hate incidents against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. She is also the executive director of AAPI Equity Alliance, a coalition of community-based organizations that advocate for the rights and needs of the Asian American community in Southern California. She was formerly the executive director of the South Asian Network, an organization dedicated to advancing the health and empowerment of people of South Asian origin in Southern California. It’s one of the oldest South Asian American community-based organizations in the U.S. Her advocacy focuses on effective policies and practices related to health and healthcare, civil rights and violence prevention. In 2014, Kulkarni received the White House Champions of Change award for her dedication to improving healthcare access for South Asian Americans.

The remaining six women are included in the Entrepreneurs category of the coveted list. They include Revathi Advaithi, CEO, Flex; Ann Mukherjee, chair and CEO at Pernod Ricard North America; Poornima DeBolle, co-founder, Menlo Security; Anita Gupta, founder, KiwiTech; Padmasree Warrior, founder, Fable; and Jayshree Ullal, CEO, Arista. 

Revathi Advaithi took over as the CEO of the global manufacturing and supply-chain company, Flex in 2019. In her role, she oversees 200,000 employees and sets the strategic direction for a company earning $26 billion in annual revenue. Before joining Flex, she held leadership positions at Eaton and Honeywell. Additionally, she serves as a director on the boards of Uber and Catalyst.org and is a member of the MIT Presidential CEO Advisory Board.

Poornima DeBolle is the co-founder and chief product officer at Menlo Security, a leading cloud and network security company. Before starting Menlo, DeBolle was a product management executive at Juniper Networks, responsible for cloud security, security management, and security analytics. She joined Juniper via its acquisition of Altor Networks, where she was vice president of product management and business development.

Anita Gupta has dedicated her fifth decade to creating disruptive innovation through her company KiwiTech’s investment in over 500 startups. She is a founder and chief portfolio officer at Kiwitech, a company that helps early to growth-stage startups build viable products, raise capital, and scale their businesses. She is particularly interested in providing training and strategic assistance to female and minority entrepreneurs. Before co-founding Kiwitech, while still in graduate school, she co-founded Aptara, a company focused on digital content production, publishing, editorial services, e-learning and technology services. In 2012, Aptara was sold for $144 million.

Padmasree Warrior is an innovation pro who has served as CTO of Cisco and Motorola and is currently the founder-CEO of Fable, a platform for social reading and book clubs. It raised over $28 million in 2021. She previously served as U.S. CEO and chief development officer of NIO, a Chinese electric autonomous vehicle company, where she transitioned the company from start-up to IPO on the New York Stock Exchange in three years.

Jayshree Ullal has been president and CEO of Arista Networks, a computer networking firm, since 2008. She joined the board of directors of Snowflake, a cloud computing company that went public in September 2020. The publicly-traded company recorded revenue of $2.3 billion in 2020, a decrease of nearly 4% compared to the fiscal year 2019. Ullal owns about 5% of Arista’s stock, some of which is earmarked for her two children, niece and nephew. In August 2018, Arista settled a multi-year patent infringement battle with Cisco, Ullal’s former employer, agreeing to pay Cisco $400 million. Born in London and raised in India, she is one of America’s wealthiest female executives.

Ann Mukherjee became the first industry outsider and first woman of color to assume the position of chair and CEO at wine and spirits company Pernod Ricard North America in 2019. Inspired by her own experiences, she launched Absolut’s #SexResponsibly campaign to raise awareness of the connection between responsible drinking and consent and to take a stand against perpetrators who use alcohol as a tool or excuse to commit crimes. Before joining Pernod, she held the roles of global CMO and global chief commercial officer at SC Johnson and was responsible for its $12 billion consumer global business division. She has also held leadership positions at Kraft Foods and PepsiCo.