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Anil Ambani gets first Wharton Indian Alumni Award

Reliance Industries managing director Anil Ambani received the First Wharton Indian Alumni Award from Dr Patrick Harker, Dean of the Wharton School, in Bombay on Tuesday.

Ambani was selected by the Wharton India Economic Forum as the recipient of the first Wharton Indian Alumni Award.

Ambani, an MBA graduate from The Wharton School (Class of 1983), also functions as the co-chief executive officer of RIL. The award recognises Ambani's contributions to the establishment of Reliance as a global leader in many of its business areas.

The Wharton School has a large Indian alumni community of over 1,000 ex-students.

Indian alumni of the Wharton School include such eminent personalities as Dr C Rangarajan, Governor of the states of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu in India, and the ex-Governor of the Reserve Bank of India; Keshub Mahindra, Chairman - Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd, one of India's leading automobile manufacturing companies; and Ranjit Pandit, Managing Director (India) - McKinsey & Company.

India is the currently the largest source of students outside the US for the Wharton School - an institution that prides itself on the truly global composition of its class with typically 40 per cent of the business class comprising non-US students.

"We chose Ambani to receive this award because of his achievements on the global playing field," said Sarin Suvarna, MBA Chair of WIEF. "Together, Ambani and Reliance have done a great deal to develop India's image as a world-class country for business."

"The theme of our conference is India's current and future global leadership," said Venkatesh Saha, Undergraduate Chair of WIEF. "We feel that Ambani epitomises such leadership."

The 2001 WIEF conference entitled "Global Leadership: Vision 2020," in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, focused on the opportunities and challenges faced by Indian businesspeople and politicians as they establish global leadership roles for themselves, their companies, and India.

Since its inception in 1996, WIEF has become the leading US forum for the discussion of business and economic issues that affect the Indian subcontinent and Indians in America. This year's conference was no exception with 300 attendees congregating in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for an energetic dialogue between current and future business leaders.

The Wharton Indian Alumni Award was instituted this year as a way for students to reach out to members of Wharton's outstanding alumni community, honor their achievements and contributions, and increase their awareness of the large and growing interest in India at Wharton.

"Receiving an honour from one's alma mater and community is always a very encouraging and beautiful experience," Ambani said. "The Wharton School and the [University of Pennsylvania] community have greatly influenced my life and made significant contributions to my success."

"What I learned [at Wharton], has guided me well in my endeavor to help build a globally competitive and truly world class organization, Reliance, out of India," he said.

Reliance group is India's largest business house with total income of over $12.9 billion, profits of $906 million, assets of $11.8 billion, and market capitalisation of over $14.4 billion.

Reliance Group's primary businesses are in the energy, oil & gas, petrochemicals, textiles, infocom, and telecom sectors. Reliance is also in the list of top 10 global producers in most of its major products.
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