Ajit Balakrishnan

Ajit Balakrishnan
Born	(1948-07-22) 22 July 1948 (age 76)
Citizenship	India
Alma mater	IIM Calcutta University of Kerala
Occupation	Chairman & CEO of Rediff.com

Ajit Balakrishnan is an Indian entrepreneur, business executive and administrator.[1] He is the founder, current chairman-Emeritus of Rediff.com, an internet company based in Mumbai.[2][3] He was chairman of the Board of Governors of Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (IIM Calcutta) for two five-year terms ending in March 2017.[4]

Education

Balakrishnan holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of Kerala and an MBA from Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (1971).[5]

Business

Balakrishnan's first business was Rediffusion, now known as Rediffusion DY&R (Dentsu Young & Rubicam), which he co-founded when he was 22. In 1995, he founded Rediff.com, which became a highly successful internet site, and was listed on NASDAQ in 2001.[6]

Writing

He writes a column in Business Standard[7] and has written a book published by Macmillan Publishers[8] called The Wave Rider.[9] He has co-authored a research paper, Generic Framework for a Recommendation System using Collective Intelligence,[10] with Alkesh Patel which was presented at the International Conference on Internet Technology and Secured Transactions, 2009.

Public service

Balakrishnan served as the Chairman of the Board of Governors of IIM Calcutta for two five-year terms ending in March 2017.[11] He has in the past served on the Governing Council of Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC).[12][13] He was named Chairman Emeritus of the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI).[14] He served as the chairman of the Govt of India, Ministry of Information Technology Working Group on Internet Governance and Proliferation. He chaired a committee appointed by India's Ministry of Human Resource Development on 'Research and Faculty Enhancement at the 7 IIMs'. He was a member of the Central Advisory Board of Education of the Government of India.[15]

References

1. "Ajit Balakrishnan: India's 'Internet genius'". afaqs!. 1 August 2023. Retrieved 28 September 2023.
2. Stephen Wilmot (26 May 2011). "How I made it: Ajit Balakrishnan". Financial Times. Retrieved 8 February 2012.
3. "Ajit Balakrishnan, Rediff.com". dare.co.in. 1 June 2008. Archived from the original on 17 December 2011. Retrieved 8 February 2012.
4. "Speaker Corner: Ajit Balakrishnan". Forbes. Archived from the original on 12 February 2009. Retrieved 8 February 2012.
5. "Ajit Balakrishnan". NDTV. Archived from the original on 26 September 2012. Retrieved 8 February 2012.
6. Rediff listed on NASDAQ in 2001.
7. "Columnists - Business Standard". Retrieved 8 March 2024.
8. "Book Review: The Wave Rider". Retrieved 8 March 2024.
9. Balakrishnan, Ajit (6 December 2012). The Wave Rider: A Chronicle of the Information Age. Pan Macmillan. ISBN 9781447241157.
10. Patel, A.; Balakrishnan, A. (2009). "Generic framework for recommendation system using collective intelligence". 2009 International Conference for Internet Technology and Secured Transactions, (ICITST). pp. 1–6. doi:10.1109/ICITST.2009.5402612. ISBN 978-1-4244-5648-2. S2CID 818956.
11. Board of Governors - IIM Calcutta.
12. Centre for Development of Advanced Computing
13. "Council". cdac.in. Archived from the original on 26 September 2017.
14. "Chairman Emeritus at IAMAI". Archived from the original on 24 September 2015.
15. Central Advisory Board of Education ^[permanent dead link‍].

External links

• The Wave Rider