Shri Vivek Gupta
Director (RM & L), SAIL, India

Shri Vivek Gupta is a Civil Engineer, having over 38 years of experience of working in the Company in different capacities at both Plant as well as at Corporate Office of the Company. Having joined IISCO Steel Plant initially, he rose to the level of General Manager (Projects) there, before joining Corporate Office as Executive Director (Projects).

Thereafter, he was posted as in charge of the Visvesvaraya Iron & Steel Plant. Prior to joining as Director (Raw Materials & Logistics) he was posted as Executive Director (Projects & Operations) at Raw Materials Division (RMD) of the Company, overseeing the projects and operational activities of RMD.

V R Sharma
Managing Director, JSPL, India

 

B P Pandey
Mining Expert, India

 

MV Subba Rao
CMD, KIOCL, India

Mr MV Subba Rao with more than 3 decades of experience in Steel Industry with State, Central & MNC companies, has taken over the Charge of Chairman-cum-Managing Director of the Schedule ‘A’, Mini-Ratna, Category | Company, KIOCL Limited, under the auspices of Ministry of Steel, Government of India. Shri Rao holds the Master’s Degree in Marketing, Bachelor’s Degree in Metallurgy along with PG Diploma in Marketing.

Started his professional career as a Production In-charge with M/s Mittal Group and later on shifted to M/s A.P Steels Ltd., (A PSU under AP Govt.), Vikram Ispat (A unit of Grasim Industries Ltd.,) for career growth. He has led number of pioneering projects viz., Introduction of Gas based DRI/ HBI in primary & secondary steel sectors.

As the current CMD, Mr Rao, with his commercial acumen and positive outlook, has established sustainable business relationship with customers, partners, suppliers and stakeholders across the world. Under the leadership of him, the company has been recognized with “Certificate of Appreciation for Outstanding Exporter for FY 2011-12″ by Customs Commissionerate, Mangalore. With his vast experience and expertise in the field of Metallurgy, Mr MV Subba Rao has presented and published several technical papers related to Steel Making, Sponge Iron, and Modernization of Steel Industry etc.

 

Sauvick Mazumdar
CEO, Sesa Goa Iron Ore Business (Vedanta Ltd.), India

 

Pavan Kakani
Head Marketing (Domestic & Export), Essel Mining, India
Mr. Pavan Kumar Kakani is currently heading Marketing, Sales, Strategy, & Exports at the Iron ore & Noble Ferro Alloys divisions of Mineral Resources & Mining Business (Essel Mining & Industries Limited), a part of the US$41 billion Aditya Birla Group.

He holds a degree in Mechanical Engineering & Masters in Business Administration (Finance) with 27 years of extensive experience in handling multi-commodities like Iron Ore, Noble Ferro alloys, Oleo Chemicals, Palm Oil, Rubber & Cement, across the globe.

He has proficiently handled various domains ranging from Domestic & International Commodity Marketing, Import, Export, Sales Management, Centralized Procurement, Negotiation, Supply chain, Business Development and Control, Project Management, Long Term Business Strategy Formulation, Joint Ventures, Mergers, Acquisitions, Divestments and Manufacturing in diversified businesses amidst both Indian & global markets.

In addition to having an excellent business acumen & a sharp commercial mind, Pavan has developed himself as a proactive, transformational leader exhibiting qualities like the ability to experiment & take calculated risks, make & stand with difficult decisions, share collective organizational consciousness and communicate ideas constructively.

Dillip Kumar Mohanty
CGM (Mining), OMC Ltd., India
Mr Dillip Kumar Mohanty graduated in Mining Engineering from REC (now NIT), Rourkela in the year 1984. He acquired 1st Class MMCC in 1992 and passed Advance Diploma in Management from IGNOU in 1999.

Mr Mohanty started his career as a Lecturer in Mining Engineering at the School of Mining Engineering in Keonjhar, Odisha. From 1989 onwards he worked in different capacities viz. Mining, Production, Planning, Material Management, Mines Safety, Sales & Marketing at the Odisha Mining Corporation Limited (OMC), a Gold Category State PSU of Odisha.

At present he is working as the Chief General Manager (Mining) in E-8 grade in OMC Ltd., heading both Production (Mining) and Sales-Marketing Wings of the organization.
He is also an Honorary Secretary at ‘The Council of Mining, Geological & Metallurgical Institute of India’, Bhubaneswar Chapter.

 

Rajiv Kumar
Senior General Manager- Mining, Fomento Resources, India

Rajiv Kumar is a mining professional, possessing a B. Tech. (Mining) from Indian School of Mines (IIT Dhanbad) from 1993 Batch and has more than 25 years of experience of Opencast Mining in India.

He started his career from M/s Almora Magnesite Mines a joint venture of UPSMDC, TRL and SAIL. Since 1999, he has been working in various Mines in various capacities in Goa and has worked with M/s Chowgule and Company Pvt. Limited and is currently working with M/s Sociedade Fomento Industries Pvt. Ltd. a Fomento Group Companies as a Senior General Manager- Mines.

He is a holder of First Class Mines Manager certificate issued by D. G. M. S. India. He has also done an Executive Business Management from Indian Institute of Management Calcutta in the year 2010.

He has authored papers and presentations at various forums and has valuable experience in Iron Ore mining and profound knowledge on the legislations governing the mining industry.

 

Somesh Biswas
Chief, Raw Materials Strategy, Corporate Strategy & Planning, Tata Steel, India
Mr Somesh Biswas is the Chief Raw Material Strategy in Tata Steel. He has the experience for Mining to Market as in his 25 years of experience in the industry, he has worked in different functions – Spanning from Steel Plant Maintenance, Operation, Improvement Program, to Marketing & Sales. He has also worked in different Strategy functions like Group Strategy, Corporate Strategy, Marketing Strategy and currently he is in Raw Material Strategy responsible for mineral block acquisition. He has done his Post Graduate Diploma in Business Management from Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar and Graduation in Mechanical Engineering.

 

Manish Kharbanda
Group Advisor - New Mines Development, JSPL & President, PMAI, India
Mr. Manish Kharbanda, is the current Advisor for Corporate Affairs, Legal, CSR & New Mines Development and has been the Executive Director, Head of Corporate Affairs, CSR, Environment, Sustainability and HSE Functions at Jindal Steel & Power Ltd. since October 4, 2017. Mr. Kharbanda is also the president of Pellet Manufacturers’ Association of India. He served as Chief Executive Officer of Mines & Minerals at Jindal Steel & Power Ltd. from September 15, 2015 to October 4, 2017. He also served as Head of Human Resources at MTS. He was the Chief Human Resource Officer of Sistema Shyam Tele Services Limited. He holds MBA in Human Resources, M.Sc Geology and LLB.

 

R N Bhargava
Chairman, Ecomen Laboratories Pvt Ltd., India
Mr R N Bhargava is Chairman cum Managing Director of Ecomen Laboratories Pvt Ltd., a Lucknow based company providing expertise in all aspects of Environment and Forestry. He is an executive from Corporate Sector (Tata Steel). He is an Engineer, with an MBA from PGDBM (XLRI). Mr Bhargava is also an Environmental Auditor from IEMA (a full member), UK. He has 56 years of experience, in which an exclusive of 25 years were dedicated to environmental monitoring, testing, studies and preparation of around 100 EIA/EMP reports. Mr Bharagava has also authored a few books and contributed articles on environment in journals. He is a distinguished Speaker, presenting papers on various aspects of environment in renowned forums.

 

Kapil Mantri
Head- Corporate Strategy & Business Development, JSPL, India
Mr. Kapil Mantri heads the Corporate Strategy and Business Development for Jindal Steel & Power Ltd group. He leads Corporate Strategy, New Business Development, Market Intelligence, Mineral Auction, Merger & Acquisition functions. Mr. Mantri has extensive experience in Steel, Power, Iron Ore, Coal and Mining Sector.

He is Managing Committee Member of PHDCCI, Co-Chairman: National Council on Power – ASSOCHAM and also actively engages with various industries bodies / associations including CII, IPPAI, Association of Power Producers (APP), Sponge Iron Manufactures Association (SIMA).

He is also on the board of many companies such as Jindal United Steel Limited, OPJ Trading Private Ltd, Kineta Power Ltd, JSP Cement Ltd, JSPL Overseas Ltd, JSPL Energy Ltd, JSP Power (Raigarh) Ltd, Clean Current Pvt Ltd.

He holds a Bachelor‘s Degree in Engineering from National Institute of Technology Karnataka, Surathkal and is MBA from Indian School of Business, Hyderabad. He is also an Alumni of Darden School of Business, University of Virginia.

 

Rahul Mittal
Chairman,Sponge Iron Manufacturer's Association, India
Mr. Rahul Mittal was appointed as full time Director of Janki Corp Limited in 2012. He is one of the individual promoters. He is an alumnus of Shri Ram College of Commerce, New Delhi and has also completed his Masters in Management from University of Nottingham. He looks after the activities of Iron & Steel division. Additionally, he is a director in JPL Industries Limited. He is a Governing council member in the industry’s prestigious body – Sponge Iron Manufacturers’ Association (SIMA).

 

Sanjiv Garg
Founder & CEO – Jindal Intellicom Limited, India
Sanjiv is an entrepreneur at heart. He started his professional journey with a nuclear consulting company in the US. After spending six productive years in the organization and achieving several milestones, he returned to India to pursue his dream of starting something of his own. Although his initial venture failed, he took the learnings to his next engagement at Jindal SAW, where his entrepreneurial zeal soon saw him spearhead an idea, which over the ensuing two decades has turned into one of India’s leading process management and development organizations, JindalX (formerly known as Jindal Intellicom).
Sanjiv, by his own admission, is a person who ‘cannot sit still’. Over the last two decades, while he was building up JindalX, he was also busy setting up an iron ore mine, a 2 million MT/year beneficiation plant, a 10 million liter per day STP for the city of Bhilwara and a 1.2 MMT/year palletization plant. He also serves as a Director at iCom Analytics Limited, Keystone Mines Pvt. Ltd. and Quality Iron and Steel Ltd. Sanjiv completed B.Tech from Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and M.Sc. in Engineering from Northwestern University, USA.
Sanjiv believes strongly in making a difference, not just in the business world but also as a philanthropist. He was part of the founding team of Sarla Memorial Govt. College for Girls at Safidon, Kali Ram DAV School and PardadaPardadi Education Society at Anupshahr, Uttar Pradesh.

 

D P Deshpande
Ex-Chairman of SIMA & Ex-MD of Tata Sponge, India

Mr Deshpande was the former Chairman of The Sponge Iron Manufacture’s Association (SIMA) from 2015-2019, and the former Managing Director of Tata Sponge Iron Ltd.

An Executive Director in Tata Metaliks Ltd. Kolkata and before that a Chief (coke, Sinter and Iron) at Tata Steel, during the expansion phase from 6.8 MTPA to 10 MTPA. Mr Deshpande worked as the Chief of Project for the Coke oven expansion at Jamshedpur and Kalinganagar Project of Tata Steel. A TQM practicing Manager, trained in Japan at The Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers. Mr Deshpande led the efforts of the Coke, Sinter and Iron Group, during Tata Steel’s successful challenge to Deming award. He has also been trained at the Goldratt programs for ToC and its applications.

Mr Deshpande is a trained assessor for the group companies in the Tata Business Excellence Model. Chairman of the integration panel with Tata Steel Europe on Raw materials, while at TSL. An executive committee member of the CII Eastern Regional Council and the joint Chairman of the Manufacturing Committee of the CII, Eastern Regional Council. An invitee member of the industry on the panel to review the research projects of the NML, JSR. Authored, co-authored twelve papers which were published in the international journals. Invited speaker by the SteelMint in India, CNBC TV India, ET now India. Mr Deshpande is currently working as an Independent consultant for new steel projects and projects for improvement in steel plants.

 

N D Rao
Consultant, India

 

Dr Hossein Etminan
Sales & Marketing Manager, Golgohar Mining & Industrial Company, Iran

Hossein Etminan is Sales and Marketing Manager of Golgohar Mining and Industrial Company. Gogohar is the largest producer of raw material of steel making in the middle east and also pioneer in the world. Hossein joined Golgohar, in 2009 till now as sales manager focusing on raw material of steel making market. He has done some valuable research in steel making raw material such as:

Pricing method of iron ore, concentrate and pellet
Branding of steel making raw material
Optimization of the best suitable quality of raw material for steel making

He has valuable experience in Copper industry from 2007-2009 as quality control manager in Nation Iranian copper industries. Hossein hold Ph.D. degree in Extractive Metallurgy Engineering from Iran University of Science and Technology.

 

Kaushalendra Prasad
Director, Star Global LLC, Dubai

Mr Kaushalendra Prasad is a veteran of Iron Ore Industry, having more than 48 years of Global experience spread across, Iron Ore, Pelletizing, DRI, and Shipping Logistics.

He started his career with Kudremukh Iron Ore Mine in India in 1966, and continued to head the Commercial division till 1990. He joined Bahrain Steel in 1990 and became its CEO in 2011. During his tenure with Bahrain Steel, he established Bahrain Steel as a major supplier of DR Pellets in GCC region and turned around the company into a profitable venture. Amidst global shortage of DR grade Pellet feed, Bahrain Steel managed to secure Pellet feed from alternate sources. He has visited major Iron Ore Mines in the world.

Mr Prasad has now established his own Consultancy Co., based in Bahrain, dealing with Iron Ore, Pellets, DRI, Marketing and Project implementation, so that the Industry continues to benefit from his rich experience. He is also a Director of Star Global, a Dubai based Trading house, dealing in Steel, DRI, Steel Raw Materials.

 

Kanjanabha Bhattacharyya
President & Managing Director, Outotec, India

Mr Kanjanabha Bhattacharyya, is presently leading the market area India at Outotec as President, MA India. He holds a degree in Metallurgical Engineering from Jadavpur University and a Master’s in Business Administration from IIM Calcutta. Prior to Outotec, he has worked with Siemens (formerly VAI) and Boston Consulting Group (BCG).

VS Balarama Krishna
CEO, Amalgam Steels Pvt Ltd, India

Mr V S Balarama Krishna is a metallurgist having experience of 33 years out which he has an 18 years of experience in pellet plant operations, stabilization, getting quality pellet according to the downstream operation like gas based DRI quality, Blast furnace requirement and DRI kiln coal based.

Mr Krishna’s expertise lies within process from Iron ore beneficiation, pellet, DRI gas based as well coal based kiln, blast furnace operation and steel making Induction melting as well as Arc furnace. He started as chief process controller to a level of Director Technical, giving an advantage in knowing the process in deep and helping in stabilizing operation, getting quality, quantity, solving process related problems, doing research and development, inventing new technologies and running plant to a customer satisfaction.

He served as COO and whole time director at BMM Ispat Ltd., as a Director – Operations and Business Development at Rashmi Metaliks Ltd., and as President at Arya Iron and Steel Company Ltd. He is the current CEO of Amalgam Steels Pvt Ltd.

 

Rajesh Gupta
Director, Lloyds Group, India

Mr. Rajesh Rajnarayan Gupta is a business Graduate from Mumbai University. He is Founder Board Member of Lloyds Group.

An Experienced business Manager, in a variety of industries, including engineering, steel, power and currently mining, with a vast history of working and troubleshooting, he is specialized in Operations Management, International Sales, Procurement, Business Development and Business Strategy.

Under his Leadership, the company Lloyds Metals and Energy Ltd continues to be successful in the sponge iron industry as an independent manufacturer, as well as in running an iron ore mine in the most difficult district of Gadchiroli in Maharashtra.

 

Abhijit Kulkarni
Partner, McKinsey & Company, India

 

Sandeep Kalia
Principal Analyst

 

Hongmei Li
Head Of Editorial, Mysteel, Singapore

 

Anuj Singla
VP - Equity Research, BofA Securities, India

 

Isha Chaudhary
Associate Director, CRISIL Research, India

 

Shobhit Bagadiya
Director, Bagadiya Brothers Pvt. Ltd., India

 

Nishtha Mukerjee
Head Of Research, SteelMint, India
Ms Nishtha Mukerjee is currently the Head of Research at SteelMint, India. She has an experience of 5 years in iron and steel industry. She holds a Management degree in Finance and Marketing from School of Management & Research, ITM University and Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics & Telecommunications.

 

Manish Agrawal
Head Of Research, SteelMint, India