Rebel WITHOUT A PAUSE

Cocky. Confident. Brash. Brilliant. Bhavish Aggarwal is all of these. And he is more. At first glance he is a man on the cusp of midlife. His pitch-black hair seems to have been brushed back aggressively, revealing a growing forehead untouched by frown lines. He loves dogs. They are the only beings with unbridled access to him, in his office, in meetings or at home.
When you speak to him, he looks straight into your eyes. In his voice there is assertion. In his demeanour a worrisome paucity of doubt. Until recently he could be spotted wearing a T-shirt or even a suit. But not anymore. The 39-year-old has recently taken to the kurta and is at ease in it. It helps that it makes a statement.
But making a statement is not where Aggarwal is willing to stop. Not even at making a mark. Born to doctor parents, brought up in business-friendly Ludhiana and educated at the premier Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay, Aggarwal belongs to that sliver of the Indian middle class that has seen lives and lifestyles improve drastically since the liberalisation years. Thus, fresh out of IIT, when he secured a research role at Microsoft, it wasn’t enough for him. He quit within two years and started building Ola with his IIT-batchmate Ankit Bhati.
App-based cab hailing was new to India in 2012. Uber had been conceived only a few years prior in the US and had no plans of coming to India at the time. Ride hailing was not seen as the big business it has become in a country with patchy internet and limited access to smartphones. Yet in four years, Ola Cabs became a unicorn. In an interview with Bloomberg TV in 2015, the then 29-year-old Aggarwal said, “Our [Ola Cabs’] vision is that people won’t [need to] own cars.”
Denne historien er fra October 2024-utgaven av Outlook Business.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9500+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra October 2024-utgaven av Outlook Business.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9500+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Driving Towards Sustainable Mobility
As India transitions into the era of cleaner and more sustainable mobility solutions, it has become imperative for automakers to do more than just electrify their line-up.

A Historic Blunder
A ceasefire has been announced post-Operation Sindoor that destroyed nine terrorist bases in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), its air defence infrastructure and other military bases.

‘India serves as a testing ground for scalable solutions’
Swetha Ramdas, principal, APAC sustainability, Amazon tells Sudipto Dey in an email interview that the company is delivering orders with reduced or no packaging in over 300 cities in India. Edited excerpts

Third Time's A Charm?
As payments and lending lose their sheen, fintechs are betting on broking and wealth management as their next engines of growth

NSIC has been imparting skill training amongst aspiring entrepreneurs
National Small Industries Corporation’s CMD Subhransu Sekhar Acharya tells Outlook Business how the organisation is helping MSMEs grow. Edited excerpts:

War will affect India's attraction as an FDI destination
Ajit Ranade, senior fellow at Pune International Centre, tells Pushpita Dey that it is in India's interes to contain border conflicts. Edited excerpts

Building Blocks of a Circular Economy
Across our planet, the consumption of finite natural resources is placing a large strain on the environment, with changing geopolitical dynamics adding new dimensions to the challenge.

Mankind Gets A Booster Dose
The pharma company under Sheetal Arora is looking to increase its footprint on foreign soil by leveraging its recent acquisitions and increasing investments in R&D

Our Tier-II and Tier-III cities present youthful demographics and cost-efficient operations
Ekroop Caur, secretary, Department of Electronics, Government of Karnataka in an email interview with Shruti Tripathi discusses the state's vision to strengthen the digital ecosystem. Edited excerpts:

Taste of Tradition
An iconic sweet shop from Pune is defying the three-generation rule to scale up the business and take its products global