Uday Kotak

Uday Suresh Kotak
Born	(1959-03-15) 15 March 1959 (age 65) Mumbai, India
Education	University of Mumbai
Occupations	Founder, former MD & CEO of Kotak Mahindra Bank Chairman of IL&FS[1]
Board member of	Kotak Mahindra Bank
Spouse	Pallavi Kotak
Children	2

Uday Suresh Kotak (born 15 March 1959) is an Indian billionaire banker and founder of Kotak Mahindra Bank, where he is a non-executive director.^[2] He resigned from his CEO position in September 2023.^[3] He handed over the digital banking CEO role to his son, Jay Kotak.^[4]

In the early 1980s, while India was still a closed economy with slow economic growth, Kotak decided to start on his own, turning down a lucrative job offer from a multinational corporation.^[5] Over the next few years, he diversified his business into various areas of financial services, establishing a prominent presence in bills discounting, stockbroking, investment banking, car finance, life insurance and mutual funds.^[6]

In March 2003, Kotak Mahindra Finance Ltd. became the first company to receive a banking license from Reserve Bank of India.^[5] In 2006, he and Goldman Sachs ended their 14-year partnership when Goldman Sachs sold their 25% stake in two subsidiaries for $72 million to Kotak.^[7] Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimated his wealth to be US$14.8 billion as of April 2021.^[8]

In October 2024, Kotak was ranked 18th on the Forbes list of India’s 100 richest tycoons, with a net worth of $14.1 billion.^[9]

As per Forbes list of The Richest People In The World, dated 8 MARCH 2024 Uday Kotak ranked #148 with a net worth of $13.3 Billion.^[10]

Early life and education

Uday Kotak was born in Mumbai on 15 March 1959 to an upper-middle-class Gujarati Hindu Lohana family that engaged in cotton trading.^[11][12][13] He grew up in a large joint family in a home with 60 people living under one roof.^[11] He called this "Capitalism at work and Socialism at home".^[14] His two pastimes were cricket and playing the sitar. In a 2014 interview with NDTV, he admitted that he was no longer playing the sitar.^[14] His talent in mathematics influenced his choice of career.^[15] He earned a bachelor's degree from Sydenham College and completed a postgraduate degree in management studies in 1982 from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies.^[16]

Career

After completing his MBA, Kotak started Kotak Capital Management Finance Ltd (which later became Kotak Mahindra Finance Ltd).^[17] From a seed capital of less than US$80,000 borrowed from family and friends, he converted a bill-discounting start-up into a financial services conglomerate with assets of US$68 billion (as of March 2022), and the third largest private sector bank by market capitalization in India with over 1752 branches.^[18][19][20]

During 2014, Kotak almost doubled his wealth as shares of his Kotak Mahindra Bank hit an all-time high after he sealed a $2.4 billion deal in November 2014 for rival ING Vysya Bank, partly owned by Dutch financial services group ING.^[21] In 2015, Kotak entered the general insurance business and is partnering with telecom magnate Sunil Mittal's Bharti Airtel to start a small payments bank.^[21] Kotak has reduced his stake in the Kotak Mahindra Bank to 30% as of now, as he is required to bring it down to 20% as per RBI directions.^[21]

In August 2019 he was reported to be one of the most highly paid CEOs of any Indian bank with a monthly salary of ₹27 lakh (US$32,000).^[22] He took over as President of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) for the year 2020-21.^[23] In August 2023, it was announced that Kotak's alternate fund management and investment advisory businesses would be combined into one entity called Kotak Alternate Asset Managers (KAAM). It was reported that the entity would have $18 billion in assets under management, making it the largest asset management entity in India.^[24]

Honours and awards

• In June 2014, he was named Ernst & Young World Entrepreneur Of The Year.^[25]
• In 2015 he won the 'Business Leader of the Year Award' by Economic Times.^[26]
• He was the sole Indian Financier to feature in Money Masters: The Most Powerful People in The Financial World, by Forbes magazine, US (May 2016).^[27]
• India Today magazine ranked him #8th in India's 50 Most Powerful People of 2017 list.^[28]
• In 2018, he won the USIBC Global Leadership Award.^[29]

Memberships

Kotak is a member of the Government of India's High-Level Committee on Financing Infrastructure, the Primary Market Advisory Committee of the Securities & Exchange Board of India, Member of the Board of Governors of the National Institute of Securities Markets and the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER).^[30] He is also Governing Member of the UWC Mahindra College, and a Member of the National Council of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).^[30] Kotak is also a member of the strategic board which advises the national law firm, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas.^[31]

Personal life

He is married to Pallavi Kotak, has two children and lives in Mumbai.^[32]

References

1. "IL&FS - Board of Directors". Archived from the original on 30 December 2020. Retrieved 7 April 2019.
2. Vyas, Hitesh (2 September 2023). "Uday Kotak resigns as CEO of Kotak Mahindra Bank, to take role of non-executive director". The Indian Express. Archived from the original on 5 February 2024. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
3. Karthik, Hamsini (2 September 2023). "Uday Kotak steps down as Kotak Mahindra Bank CEO months ahead of schedule". BusinessLine. Archived from the original on 10 November 2024. Retrieved 10 November 2024.
4. "Uday Kotak's Annual Salary Will Leave You Stunned - Here's How Much He Earned". Times Now. 17 July 2024. Archived from the original on 10 November 2024. Retrieved 10 November 2024.
5. Pinelli, Maria (2 July 2014). "Rendezvous with destiny EY World Entrepreneur of the Year 2014". Forbes.com. Archived from the original on 6 July 2014. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
6. ET Online (2 September 2023). "Uday Kotak: How an outsider built a bank from scratch and made it one of the best". The Economic Times. ISSN 0013-0389. Archived from the original on 9 December 2023. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
7. "End of One Era, Beginning of Another for Goldman Sachs in India". 17 March 2006. Archived from the original on 21 January 2022. Retrieved 20 January 2022.
8. "Bloomberg Billionaires Index: Uday Kotak". Bloomberg LP. Archived from the original on 10 May 2021. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
9. "India's 100 Richest". India’s 100 Richest. 9 October 2024. Archived from the original on 3 November 2024. Retrieved 15 October 2024.
10. "The Richest People In The World".
11. Sankranti, Shashwat (8 September 2023). "Flashback Friday: Revisiting the success of the self-made billionaire banker – Uday Kotak". WION. Archived from the original on 20 July 2024. Retrieved 20 July 2024. Born in Mumbai on March 15, 1959, Uday Kotak hails from an upper-middle-class Gujarati Lohana joint family that engaged in cotton trading.
12. Patel, Aakar (13 July 2015). "Guru of giving, Azim Premji shows the way to India's Scrooges". The Times of India. ISSN 0971-8257. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
13. "Chintan Vasani becomes the Youngest Youth President of Shree Lohana Mahaparishad!". The Week. 8 April 2021. Archived from the original on 20 July 2024. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
14. "Walk The Talk with Uday Kotak". ndtv.com. 26 July 2014. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
15. Bandyopadhyay, Tamal (24 August 2018). "Uday Kotak: The 'nationalist' banker". mint. Archived from the original on 9 February 2021. Retrieved 4 February 2021.
16. "Uday Kotak Biography". mapsofindia.com. 3 June 2015. Archived from the original on 23 December 2014. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
17. Mahalakshmi, N (10 July 2015). "Uday Kotak". Outlook Business. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
18. "Kotak Mahindra Bank Consolidated Balance Sheet, Kotak Mahindra Bank Financial Statement & Accounts". moneycontrol.com. Archived from the original on 15 April 2023. Retrieved 15 April 2023.
19. "Investor Relations". Kotak Mahindra Bank. Archived from the original on 15 April 2023. Retrieved 15 April 2023.
20. "Uday Kotak". Vir Sanghvi. 5 September 2015. Archived from the original on 18 January 2018. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
21. Kyle Wong. "Uday Kotak". Forbes. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
22. Rebello, Joel (14 August 2019). "Aditya Puri remains top-paid bank CEO". Economic Times. Archived from the original on 14 August 2019. Retrieved 14 August 2019.
23. "Uday Kotak takes over as CII President". The Hindu. 3 June 2020. Archived from the original on 9 October 2020. Retrieved 22 October 2020.
24. "Kotak combines alternate funds, advisory into $18 billion asset management business". Reuters. 3 August 2023. Archived from the original on 3 August 2023. Retrieved 4 August 2023.
25. "Uday Kotak named EY World Entrepreneur Of The Year 2014". news.biharprabha.com. Biharprabha. 12 June 2014. Archived from the original on 18 January 2018. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
26. "ET Awards 2015: Uday Kotak wins Business Leader of the Year award". Economic Times. 19 October 2015. Archived from the original on 25 February 2023. Retrieved 25 February 2023.
27. Vardi, Nathan (11 May 2016). "Sole Indian Financier to feature in Money Masters: The Most Powerful People in the financial World". Forbes Magazine. Archived from the original on 18 January 2018. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
28. "India's 50 powerful people". India Today. 14 April 2017. Archived from the original on 17 April 2017. Retrieved 17 January 2018.
29. "Uday S. Kotak". World Economic Forum. Archived from the original on 25 February 2023. Retrieved 25 February 2023.
30. "IBLA 2023: Uday Kotak honoured with the Lifetime Achievement award". CNBC TV18. 2 December 2023. Archived from the original on 15 December 2023. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
31. Vyas, Maulik (10 July 2015). "Cyril Shroff ropes in business luminaries like Narayana Murthy, Deepak Parekh, Uday Kotak and others for the advisory board of his law firm". The Economic Times. Retrieved 10 August 2015.
32. "Forbes profile: Uday Kotak". Forbes.com. Archived from the original on 16 May 2019. Retrieved 20 June 2020.

External links

• Kotak Family Office