Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
Executive Chairperson
Ms. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw is a pioneer of the biotechnology industry in India and the founder of the country’s leading biotechnology enterprise, Biocon. Named among TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world, Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw is recognized as a thought leader who has made her country proud by building a globally recognized biopharmaceutical enterprise that is committed to innovation and affordability in delivering best-in-class therapeutics to patients across the globe.
As a global influencer, she is ranked among ‘World’s 25 Most Influential People in Biopharma’ by Fierce Biotech, Forbes magazine’s ‘World’s 100 Most Powerful Women’ and Fortune’s ‘Top 25 Most Powerful Women in Asia-Pacific.’ She has been recognized as the only Indian on Forbes’ list of ‘World’s Self-Made Women Billionaires.’ She has been featured in ‘The Worldview 100 List’ of the most influential visionaries by Scientific American magazine and named among the ‘100 Leading Global Thinkers’ by Foreign Policy magazine. She has been ranked as one of the world’s top 20 inspirational leaders in the field of biopharmaceuticals by The Medicine Maker Power List 2021, an index of the 100 most influential people across the globe in the field of medicine, where she has been featured consecutively since 2015.
Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw has been honoured with the Business Excellence Award – Entrepreneur of the Year 2023-24 by the BRICS -Chamber of Commerce & Industry. She has also been felicitated with the “Outstanding Business Leader of the Year” by CNBC-TV18’s India Business Leader Awards (2023) and Recipient of The 7th Annual Ban Ki-moon Award for Women’s Empowerment (2023), presented by Ban Ki-moon, the 8th United Nations Secretary General. She is also the recipient of G20 Healthcare Commitment Awards (2023) at the 21st Asian Business and Social Forum 2023 & The Healthier India Conclave 2023. Recently, she has been honored with the IKP@25 Shapers Award by IKP Knowledge Park, celebrating Kiran’s invaluable and steadfast support over 25 years to IKP, a pivotal organization driving innovation across India and also honoured with Jamsetji Tata Award by Indian Society for Quality for Pioneering Biosciences Movement in India.
She is the recipient of EY World Entrepreneur of the Year 2020 Award, which is a testimony to her entrepreneurial journey of over four decades.Her achievements have been recognised with the ‘Lifetime Achievement Award for Outstanding Achievement in Healthcare’ by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), New Delhi. She has also been honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the FICCI-Healthcare Excellence Awards 2019, in recognition of her valuable contribution and exemplary work in the field of Healthcare. She has also been conferred the US India Business Council Global Leadership Award at the USIBC .India Ideas Summit 2018, in recognition to her contributions and leadership across roles and sectors. She was felicitated with ‘Advancing Women in Science and Medicine (AWSM) Award for Excellence’ 2017 by The Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, USA. She has been named ‘India’s Most Respected Entrepreneur’ for 2017 by the prestigious Hurun Report and felicitated as an exceptional woman achiever by Ministry of Women and Child Development, Govt. of India for being the first Indian business woman to reach USD 1 billion net-worth.
In January 2020, she was honoured with the Order of Australia, Australia’s Highest Civilian Honour, for her significant service to advancing Australia’s bilateral relationship with India, particularly in promoting commercial and educational links. In 2016, she was conferred with the highest French distinction – Chevalier de l’Ordre National de la Légion d’Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honour). She was also bestowed with ‘The Global Leadership in Engineering Award’ by Los Angeles-based USC Viterbi, School of Engineering in 2016 for excellence in biotechnology worldwide. The U.S.-based Chemical Heritage Foundation has conferred her with the ‘2014 Othmer Gold Medal’ and the Germany-based Kiel Institute for the World Economy has awarded her its coveted ‘2014 Global Economy Prize’ for Business. She has received two of India’s highest civilian honours, the Padma Shri (1989) and the Padma Bhushan (2005).
Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw holds key positions in various industries, educational, government, and professional bodies. She is a founding member of Karnataka’s Vision Group on Biotechnology, which she currently chairs. Additionally, she has been appointed Chairperson of the Karnataka government’s Vision Group to encourage pharmaceutical and medical devices units in the state. She is the Non-Executive Chairperson of the Association of Biotechnology Led Enterprises (ABLE), a not-for-profit pan-India forum representing the Indian biotechnology sector. She served as a member of the high-level expert committee constituted by the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) to review the autonomous organizations under the administrative control of the department, and she is a past Governing Council Member of the National Institute of Immunology, an autonomous research institute of the DBT. She has also served as a member of the Steering Committee of the National Biopharma Mission, an industry-academia collaborative mission of the DBT.
She has been appointed as the Vice Chair of the Global Board of Directors of U.S.-India Business Council (USIBC) and serves as Honorary Member of Indio-American Chamber of Commerce. She is a past member of Advisory Council of the UK-India Business Council. She has been appointed as Global Alumni Ambassador for Australia by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Australia and she has been appointed as the Victorian Business Ambassador by The State Govvt. of Victoria, Australia. She served as the Board of Trustees of the US Pharmacopeia Convention and currently she is a Honorary member. She also served as a member of the Governing Body of the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission. She is the Honorary Consul of Ireland in Bangalore.
Ms Mazumdar-Shaw serves as a full-term member of the Board of Trustees of The MIT Corporation, USA, and is on the advisory board of the Abdul Latif Jameel Clinic for Machine Learning in Health at MIT (J-Clinic), U.S., which seeks to transform healthcare with artifical intelligence and machine learning. She serves on the board of advisors for The National Society of High School Scholars, U.S., and served as the board of trustees of the Keck Graduate Institute in the U.S. She has been elected as a member of the prestigious U.S. based National Academy of Engineering (NAE), for her contribution to the development of affordable bio-pharmaceuticals and the biotechnology industry in India, and she is a first female Foreign Fellow to be elected as a member of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering (ATSE). Appointed as a Fellow Member (2025), Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi, which promotes science in India and harnessing scientific knowledge for the cause of humanity and national welfare. She has been appointed as Member of the Court of Regents at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and has also been elected as the Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE), Scotland’s National Academy for the advancement of learning and useful knowledge.
She serves as an Independent Director on the Board of Trent Limited (a Tata Enterprise) and as a Non-Executive Director on the Board of Narayana Health and she was the Lead Independent Member of the Board of Infosys from 2018 to 2023. Additionally, she serves on the boards of PureTech Health, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in the USA. She is also on the Board of Directors of Science Gallery Bengaluru, which is part of the Global Science Gallery Network initiated by Trinity College Dublin. Recently, she has been appointed as the Member of Eleventh Auditor Advisory Board of Comptroller & Auditor General of India (CAG), the supreme Audit Institution of India, and as an Advisory Board Member, World Audio Visual and Entertainment Summit 2025 (WAVES), a visionary initiative of the Hon’ble PM of India, aims to bring together global leaders and stakeholders to drive collaboration, forster innovation and accelearate industry growth. Also, as the Advisory Board Member of THE BRIJ, SK Munjal Creativity Initiative.
She is a member of the Board of Governors at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, a founding member of the Society for the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine in Bangalore, and a former Chairperson of the Board of Governors at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore. She has served on the Board of the Indian School of Business (ISB) and is currently a member of the Governing Board. She is also a member of the International Advisory Council of Chanakya University, Bengaluru. She also serves as the Governing Board Member of Institute of Bioinformatics & Applied Biotechnology (IBAB), an autonomous institution set up by the Department of IT, BT and S&T of the Government of Karnataka, and The Centre for Human Genetics (CHG), engaged in advanced research, education and specialized training in human genetics and genomics, especially in the context of human disease.
Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw is involved in several charitable organisations. She serves on the Global Advisory Committee for the Women and the Green Economy Campaign (WAGE)™ initiative and is a member of the MIT Charter Society, USA, in honour of her philanthropic commitment to the Institute. She is also associated with The Live Love Laugh Foundation, a leading not-for-profit organisation spreading mental health awareness, as a member of its Board of Trustees. She serves as the Co-Chair of The Lancet Citizens’ Commission on Reimagining India’s Health System, an ambitious, cross-sectoral endeavour to lay out the roadmap to achieving universal health coverage for the people of India. She hasbeen appointed as a Non- Executive Director on the Board of Directors of CSEP – The Centre for Social and Economic Progress, an independent, public policy think tank with a mandate to conduct research and analysis on critical issues facing India and the world and helps shape policies that advance sustainable growth and development.
Ms Mazumdar-Shaw’s commitment to affordable healthcare extends beyond business. Her philanthropic initiatives are directed at making a difference to the lives of the marginalized communities. Through Biocon Foundation’s primary healthcare centres, telemedicine initiatives, health awareness programs, public health and sanitation initiatives and preventive screenings for oral and cervical cancer, she is making an enduring impact on society.
She has also established the 1,400-bed Mazumdar-Shaw Medical Center in Bangalore to deliver affordable world-class cancer care services to patients irrespective of socio-economic status. She has also set up the Mazumdar Shaw Center for Translational Research, a non-profit research institute dedicated to developing scientific breakthroughs for treating a wide range of human diseases. Her philanthropic efforts have led her to be featured in the Forbes’ List of ‘Heroes of Philanthropy’. In 2023, EdelGive and Hurun India recognized Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw as the Second most generous women philanthropist in India. Ms. Mazumdar-Shaw is also the second Indian to join the Giving Pledge global initiative created by Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates that encourages billionaires to give the majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes.
Ms Mazumdar-Shaw holds a bachelor’s degree in science (Zoology Hons.) from Bangalore University and has earned a master’s degree in malting and brewing from Ballarat College, Melbourne University. She has been awarded with several honorary degrees from Ballarat (2004), University of Abertay (2007), University of Glasgow (2008), Heriot-Watt University (2008), National University of Ireland (2012) and Trinity College, Dublin (2012) for her pre-eminent contributions in the field of biotechnology.
Ms Mazumdar-Shaw believes in compassionate capitalism and is the first woman business leader from India to sign the Giving Pledge, an initiative of the Gates Foundation, committing to give the majority of her wealth to philanthropic causes. Her philanthropic efforts have led her to be featured in the Forbes’ List of ‘Heroes of Philanthropy’. In 2023, EdelGive and Hurun India recognized her as the Second most generous women philanthropist in India.
A long-standing patron of the Arts, she is closely associated with initiatives to build platforms that encourage artists, as well as make the Arts accessible to a wide range of audiences in India.
Ms Mazumdar-Shaw’s husband, Mr. John Shaw, served as the Vice Chairman of Biocon for 22 years. A Scotsman and an Indophile, he had contributed majorly to the transformation of Biocon from a small enzymes company to a globally recognized biopharmaceutical company. He played an important role in ensuring the highest levels of corporate governance in the Company, as well as in the financial and strategic development of the group. Before joining Biocon in 1999, he headed a leading textiles company, Madura Coats, as Chairman.
