Philanthroper Kings
BECAUSE the simple and frugal Premji Sr is India’s leading philanthropist who has transferred most of his personal wealth to the Azim Premji Foundation, be it his shareholding in Wipro, Wipro Enterprises or a range of assets owned through PremjiInvest, creating an endowment worth nearly $29 bn (Rs 2.4 lakh crore) as of January 2023
BECAUSE PremjiInvest, Wipro’s venture capital arm, has been nurturing startups, and along with sovereign wealth funds of Abu Dhabi and Singapore, plans to invest Rs 9,900 crore in Kotak Group’s new alternative investment fund WORLDWIDE PHILANTHROPY In Benelux, the foundation runs volunteering initiatives to help children with long-term illnesses. Following the war in Ukraine, it provided humanitarian, medical and emergency relief to Ukrainian refugees in Romania. In Australia, it supports the repair and renovation of shelter homes for women in distress. In the US, it partnered with First Book to donate 40,000 books to kids from disadvantaged sections
BECAUSE under Premji Jr’s stewardship, Wipro is now one of India’s largest IT companies, with Rs 90,490 crore gross revenues and Rs 11,350 crore net income in FY22
BECAUSE Wipro announced four strategic global business lines organised around cloud, enterprise technology and business transformation, engineering and consulting in February, to deepen alignment with clients’ needs
BECAUSE the company is taking the acquisition route to growth, buying USbased Rizing Intermediate Holdings Inc. and Convergence Acceleration Solutions. It also has a joint goto market partnership with the Palo Altobased startup vFunction EXTRACURRICULAR PURSUITS Goa is Premji Jr’s favourite getaway, while The Shawshank Redemption and Sholay are his favourite movies. Always open to learning, he’s currently reading How Will You Measure Your Life: Lessons from Some of the World’s Greatest Businesses by Clayton M. Christensen