Dr. Shankar Venugopal

Vice President, Mahindra & Mahindra

Dr Shankar Venugopal is a Vice President at Mahindra & Mahindra. He leads the technology innovation and intellectual property portfolio for Mahindra’s automotive and farm business. He is the Dean of the Mahindra Technical Academy. Dr Shankar has led technology innovation at GE, Dow, Honeywell and Cummins prior to joining Mahindra. He holds a Ph.D in Materials Science from IISc and a management degree from IIM Bangalore. He is a prolific inventor with thirty International and Indian granted patents. He won IISc’s Best Thesis Award, GE’s Edison Inventor Medal and Prolific Inventor Award World Intellectual Property Forum. He was a member of the B20 Task Force for driving technology, innovation and R&D for business growth.

---

Dr. Ravi Kumar L.

Sci. Engr. 'G' and Group Director, U R Rao Satellite Centre, ISRO, Bengaluru

Dr L Ravi Kumar graduated in Electronics and Communication Engineering, M.Tech in Instrumentation Engineering and Ph.D in Aero space Engineering from IISc Bangalore. He has joined Control System Group, URSC, ISRO, in 1997. He has been involved with the design and development of Attitude and Orbit Control System for spacecraft and Autonomous LEB sequencer design for Mars Orbiter Mission. He has been Deputy Project Director (DPD AOCS) (SPADEX, Navic, INSAT4C, 4CR and GSAT7). The major contribution includes development Robotics based Rendezvous Simulation Laboratory for SPADEX testing. Currently, He is Group Director for Mission Simulation Group (MSG), CDA, URSC. His contribution includes development of hardware and software for satellite dynamics, attitude control, interplanetary missions for Hardware in Loop Simulation (HILS). In addition, he has been working in Space Robotics, Cooperative control, formation control, optimal control, Computer Vision, AI and ML for future space application. His has awarded PhD on advanced constrained optimization for space rendezvous and docking. He has published more than 35 technical papers in national and international journals.

---

Dr. (Mrs.) Manju Nanda

Chief Scientist, CSIR - NAL

Dr. (Ms.) Manju Nanda is a Chief Scientist in the ALD Division, specializing in safety-critical embedded systems and software design and development. With extensive expertise in enabling software technologies and certification processes, she focuses on the design and development of safety systems for embedded critical applications. Dr. Nanda’s specialization includes model-based systems engineering, formal methods, system assurance methodologies, and the development of certification frameworks, driving innovation and reliability in safety-critical environments.