Prof. Aneel Karnani

Associate Professor of Strategy, Ross School of Business

Chair of Strategy

Mr. Atul Kishore

Manager – Ford Asia Pacific and Africa Strategy,

Ford Motor Company

Topic: India Automotive Industry and Ford India

Atul Kishore is Business Strategy and Associations Manager for Ford Asia Pacific and Africa Operations where he is responsible for twelve countries in the region.  In this position he has developed corporate alliances with external business partners for JVs and manufacturing opportunities.

Atul began the Strategy and Associations Manager role in May 2004. Prior to that, he was Chief Engineer for Ford's Emerging Market and Sourcing Implementation Department.  In this role, he was responsible for developing and sourcing product to new suppliers in the Emerging Markets of Brazil, Mexico, China and India. Key commodity sourcing and platform commonization were under his direction. 

Preceding that assignment, Atul was Senior Director of OEM applications at Wingcast, a Qualcomm and Ford joint venture for Telematics.  His team was responsible for the engineering development supporting all non-Ford customers. 

Before joining Ford, Atul worked for Nissan and Toyota.  At Nissan he was the first employee from Nissan Technical Center to go on an international assignment to Japan and work in their Electronics Reliability and Design Sections.  Atul was awarded several President Awards for performance and new product launches while at Nissan.  At Toyota, Atul worked in the electronics design department, developing future navigation systems.

Mr. Anand Rao

Associate Director, Corporate Development,

Kellogg Company

Topic: Kellogg’s India Experience

Anand Rao is an Associate Director in the Corporate Development group for the Kellogg Company where he is currently responsible for M&A in Emerging Markets. Anand is a well-rounded professional with a strong portfolio of success in varied finance assignments across diverse international locations. He has wide-ranging expertise in strategy development, financial planning, reporting, performance analysis cost control and profit delivery. He has extensive experience in mergers and acquisitions, process design, re-engineering and implementing solutions.

Anand joined Kellogg in 1993 as the Finance Controller for Kellogg India Ltd.  Prior to becoming the Associate Director for Corporate Development in 2006, he held several positions at the company, such as CFO for Kellogg Warehouse Club Division, Finance Manager for  DSDD - Kellogg Snacks, Senior Manager for Corporate Financial Reporting, Senior Project Manager for the EBA Program- Asia Pacific and Asia-Pacific Representative for Kellogg Europe. 

Prior to joining Kellogg, he worked for Ashok Leyland Limited and Fraser & Ross in India. He has an MBA (Finance) from the Northeastern Illinois University, Chicago and a Bachelors of Commerce degree from the University of Madras, India. He is also an Associate member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.