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Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What happens when artificial intelligence moves beyond the screen and begins to reshape the physical world? In this compelling episode of Money Majlis, host Suvo Sarkar is joined from China by Dr Wanli Min, founder and CEO of North Summit Capital and former Chief Machine Intelligence Scientist at Alibaba Cloud. Together, they explore the rapidly evolving frontier where AI meets roads, factories, ports, energy systems, logistics networks and the everyday machinery of modern cities.   Dr Min brings an unusually broad perspective to the conversation. A statistician trained at the University of Chicago, he has worked at IBM, Google and Alibaba, helped build the pioneering City Brain platform, and now invests in technology-enabled transformation across asset-heavy industries. His central proposition is clear: meaningful AI value is not created by fashionable technology alone. It emerges from identifying the right problem, securing the right data, combining algorithms with deep domain knowledge, and working with customers prepared to change how they operate.   The discussion examines how City Brain moved beyond simply displaying traffic information to influencing real operational outcomes. Dr Min explains how AI can actively manage traffic signals, create “green waves” for ambulances, reduce congestion and improve emergency response. He shares examples from Hangzhou, where City Brain helped significantly improve traffic congestion rankings, and from Jinan, where AI optimisation of a citywide heating system reduced energy consumption by 15 percent, lowering both costs and emissions.   For the GCC, the lessons are especially relevant. As Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh and NEOM invest in smart infrastructure, logistics, advanced manufacturing and new urban models, Dr Min argues that smaller, measurable pilots are often more effective than overly ambitious programmes. Strong governance, public trust, data privacy, senior sponsorship and coordination across government agencies are as important as technical capability.   The episode also provides a practical framework for bankers, investors and corporate leaders. Dr Min outlines how he assesses AI ventures: is there a meaningful problem to solve, sufficient and relevant data, a customer willing to deploy, and the domain expertise required to make the solution work? He also offers a candid view on humanoid robots, warning that captivating demonstrations must ultimately be tested against safety, commercial viability and real-world application.   The conversation considers China’s industrial AI ecosystem, the future convergence of language-based and physical-world AI, and the capabilities tomorrow’s leaders will need. Dr Min’s enduring message is simple but powerful: problem first, technology second. The greatest AI opportunity may lie not in the cloud, but where algorithms meet human judgement, operational data and the physical economy.   Dr Min recommends the following book for AI practitioners : “AI Driven Leader” by Geoff Woods. Click here for details : https://www.aileadership.com/book   Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld   Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback India is often described in sweeping, seductive shorthand: a billion-plus consumers, a vast middle class, digital leapfrogging and an inevitable march towards premiumisation. But as Rama Bijapurkar argues in this episode of Money Majlis, that picture is not merely incomplete; it can lead businesses, banks and investors towards profoundly wrong decisions.   Rama, one of India’s most influential thinkers on consumer behaviour and strategy, joins Suvo to unpack the central idea of her latest book, Lilliput Land: India’s mega-consumption story is built not on one uniform market, but on millions of small consumers and suppliers, each making modest but consequential choices, increasingly connected through powerful digital rails. The lesson is simple but demanding: there is no single “Indian consumer”. There are many Indias, many income realities, many ambitions and many versions of value.   The conversation moves beyond familiar clichés about India’s middle class, rural markets and digital payments. Rama explains why companies must learn to see the country at a far more granular level: the affluent customer in a small town, the aspirational household that must choose between a new refrigerator and a family holiday, the woman whose income may not translate into financial autonomy, and the small merchant whose QR code has made participation in the digital economy possible.   For bankers and fintech leaders, this is an especially rich conversation. Rama explores the economics of serving customers with small balances, small transactions and limited financial resilience; the role of public-sector banks, NBFCs and fintechs in financial inclusion; and the tension between instant digital credit and responsible lending. She also discusses why trust still matters in banking, why a beautiful app is not the same as a meaningful customer relationship, and why regulation can be an essential safeguard rather than merely a brake on innovation.   The episode also looks at artificial intelligence through a customer lens. Rama warns against mistaking dashboards for understanding, or using AI simply to fish more efficiently in an existing pond. The real task for boards and management teams, she argues, is to remain humble, observant and relentlessly focused on customer-perceived value. Technology may change the ritual, but it does not change the religion of customer-centricity.   This is a masterclass in looking beyond averages, questioning boardroom assumptions and recognising that demand often leads while supply lags. For anyone trying to build, invest, lend or lead in India, and in the emerging markets that increasingly resemble it, Rama Bijapurkar offers a sharper and more human way to see the opportunity.   Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback This episode of Money Majlis dives into how banks and regulators can finally break out of “pilot purgatory” and turn AI from hype into hard P&L impact, with one of the world’s most influential applied‑AI leaders, Alexander Sukharevsky, CEO of QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey.  Drawing on his global work with financial institutions, sovereigns and regulators, Alexander explains why 88 percent of organisations say they use AI yet only a tiny fraction see more than 20 percent EBITDA uplift, and what it really takes to move that needle. Across our conversation, Alexander lays out a concrete playbook for banks: focus on a few high‑value domains instead of scattered use cases, reinvent customer journeys and legacy processes end‑to‑end, and build the “human stack” of leaders and bankers who can speak the language of AI without needing to be data scientists. We unpack lessons from Rewired 2.0, his updated McKinsey playbook on how leading firms win with technology, and go inside case studies like DBS to show how a traditional bank can become a data‑driven, AI‑ready organisation without derailing business‑as‑usual performance. Alexander also offers a candid assessment of where the GCC and UAE are genuinely ahead of the curve: ambition, speed, bold AI investment, and where execution still lags, from fragmented pilots to under‑invested data and architecture foundations. He demystifies “agentic AI”, imagines organisations where human and virtual team‑members work side by side, and explains why CEOs must personally become chief product and transformation officers, spending time in the “machine room” instead of watching AI from the boardroom.  Along the way, Alexander tackles regulation and digital trust, the future of work, and what great bankers will look like in 2030, before sharing his own leadership journey from building two businesses from scratch to scaling QuantumBlack into a multi‑thousand‑person AI practice born in Formula 1 and now reshaping banking worldwide. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld   Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What does it take to build an iconic technology company before the technology ecosystem required to support it even exists? In this compelling episode of Money Majlis, Suvo Sarkar speaks with Dhiraj Mukherjee, co-founder of Shazam, investor, speaker and lifelong student of technological disruption. Long before smartphones, app stores and streaming, Shazam began with a deceptively simple human question: “What is this song?” Dhiraj recounts how a group of ambitious entrepreneurs built a way to identify music from a few seconds of audio over a basic mobile-phone line, then spent nearly two decades navigating the far harder challenge of finding a sustainable business model. It is a story of conviction, reinvention and resilience through the dot-com crash, the global financial crisis and the upheaval of the music industry. Dhiraj reflects on the tension at the heart of every enduring venture: holding a fixed vision while maintaining a flexible mindset. He shares why Shazam did not change its fundamental purpose, but repeatedly reinvented the way it created value: from paid SMS messages to music partnerships, advertising and streaming. His lesson for founders and leaders is refreshingly direct: stay relevant, keep learning and live to fight another day. The conversation then turns to AI, where Dhiraj brings the perspective of an early OpenAI investor and a practitioner who believes technology must be experienced, not merely discussed. He explains why failed pilots should not automatically be seen as failure, why enterprises must move beyond simply layering AI onto outdated workflows, and why the greatest opportunities in banking may lie in the “big, boring problems” of compliance, risk, credit and operational efficiency. For boards and senior leaders, this episode offers a powerful argument for curiosity, experimentation and adaptability. Dhiraj explores the importance of sandboxes and guardrails in regulated industries, the benefits of reverse mentorship across generations, and the need to build organisations around skills and learning velocity rather than static roles. He also makes the case that AI should elevate human capability, not absolve institutions of their responsibility to help people reskill and contribute at a higher level. From the founding story of Shazam to the future of autonomous financial agents, quantum computing and AI-enabled work, this is a wide-ranging conversation about navigating uncertainty with optimism, humility and disciplined action. Dhiraj’s governing principle is clear: in an age when knowledge is abundant and change is relentless, adaptability is the capability that matters most. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback Music is no longer confined to a recording, a screen or even a physical stage. It is becoming a living, visual and increasingly interactive experience. One that can travel across arenas, phones, homes, cars, livestreams, virtual worlds and, perhaps soon, the boundary between the living and the legendary. Music is no longer simply something we hear; it is increasingly becoming a living, visual and increasingly interactive experience. One that can travel across arenas, phones, homes, cars, livestreams, virtual worlds and, perhaps soon, the boundary between the living and the legendary. In this special episode of Money Majlis with Suvo Sarkar, recorded in New Delhi, Suvo speaks with Ty Roberts, one of the most influential creative technologists behind the evolution of digital music, immersive entertainment and fan experiences.  Ty’s extraordinary journey spans the earliest days of computer gaming, the development of QuickTime, interactive albums with artists including David Bowie and Todd Rundgren, and the creation of Gracenote, the metadata engine that helped transform how music is discovered across streaming platforms, cars and connected devices. He later became the first Chief Technology Officer of Universal Music Group and now leads FanTracks Digital, building new possibilities for live, hybrid and visually rich music experiences. The conversation begins with ABBA Voyage, the remarkable London production that blends avatars, live musicians, immersive visuals and emotional storytelling into a true time-machine experience. Ty explains why technology alone is never enough: authenticity rests on extraordinary attention to the smallest human details, from facial expression and body language to the precise movement of a guitarist’s hands. Suvo and Ty then explore how AI could make sophisticated immersive experiences radically more accessible, allowing more artists to create compelling visual worlds without the vast budgets traditionally associated with motion capture and visual effects. They discuss the changing economics of live music, the unexpected commercial power of merchandise during livestreams, the importance of high-quality sound and the challenge of creating a richer, more connected fan journey. The episode also takes us inside Ty’s collaborations with visionary artists. He recalls David Bowie and Brian Eno’s ambition to create generative albums that could change with every listen, and reflects on how technology is finally catching up with many ideas that once seemed impossibly futuristic. At its heart, this is a conversation about creativity, reinvention and the human connection that must remain at the centre of every technological advance. From AI-powered visuals and avatar performances to data ownership, artist rights and the concert experience of 2035, Ty Roberts offers a thought-provoking glimpse into music’s next great transformation. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What really sits behind the booming world of global wealth? In this episode of Money Majlis, Suvo Sarkar sits down with Annabel Spring, Global CEO of Allfunds, to unpack the invisible infrastructure that now powers how trillions of dollars move across borders, banks and platforms.  From Hong Kong to Dubai to Dublin, a growing share of the world’s mutual funds, ETFs and alternatives are being manufactured in one place, distributed in another, and serviced on technology stacks most investors never see. Annabel runs one of the world’s largest B2B wealthtech ecosystems, connecting more than three thousand fund groups and asset managers to hundreds of banks, private banks and wealth managers across sixty-plus markets, with close to 1.8 trillion euros in assets running through the pipes. Drawing on three decades at Morgan Stanley, Commonwealth Bank of Australia and HSBC, she explains how the old linear chain of manufacturer–distributor–client has morphed into a dense web of platforms, data pipes and service layers, all supposedly centred on the end investor. Suvo and Annabel explore where the real frictions still lie, from cross-border onboarding and KYC to legacy systems and fragmented data, and how platforms like Allfunds decide what to build, what to partner on and what to leave to others. They dive into the surge in private markets for wealth clients, why access is no longer the main barrier, and how education, liquidity design and secondary markets will determine whether alternatives truly go mainstream. The conversation covers AI, tokenisation and the “boring plumbing” that actually changes economics. Annabel separates genuine operating-model transformation from AI-washing, and describes how Allfunds is using data, analytics and blockchain rails to move from being a transaction pipe to a full-scale digital ecosystem. She also lifts the lid on the strategic logic behind the planned combination with Deutsche Börse’s Clearstream fund services and reflects on the legacy of Allfunds’ late founder, Juan Alcaraz.  Finally, from the rise of Asia and the Middle East as enduring wealth hubs to the blurring lines between private banking, mass affluent and institutional segments, Annabel shares a candid, practitioner’s view of what global wealth will look like in 2035 – and what leaders need to get right now to still matter then. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What happens when you combine a decacorn founder at the heart of the crypto infrastructure revolution with the original entrepreneur in the family who quietly built software long before “cloud” and “SaaS” became buzzwords?  In this special episode of Money Majlis, we sit down with the son–mother duo of Nikil and Usha Viswanathan to explore both the future of financial plumbing and the values that shape the people building it. Nikil is the co‑founder and CEO of Alchemy, often described as the “AWS of blockchain” – a web3 developer platform that powers a massive share of global blockchain activity, from NFT marketplaces and DeFi protocols to tokenization pilots and stablecoin rails used by major financial institutions. In just about 16 months from public launch, Alchemy went from zero to a multi‑billion‑dollar valuation with a tiny team, delivering a “team‑to‑impact ratio” that most banks and big tech firms can only dream of.  Usha, meanwhile, is the president and co‑founder of Starnik, the cloud software company she built with her husband Balu while raising two children, bootstrapping through the dot‑com boom and bust and modelling resilience, curiosity and an almost “insane” work ethic that both Nikil and his sister Tara, former CEO and co‑founder of Rupa Health, now see as their core foundation. Across the conversation, we move from the big picture to the deeply personal. Nikil explains why he believes we are moving from a world shaped by governments and banks to a world shaped by platforms and protocols – and why crypto rails will replace much of today’s antiquated financial infrastructure. He breaks down crypto’s four core use cases – from store of value to global payments and AI‑native money – and offers a hard‑hitting message to bankers who still think of digital assets as “that thing my nephew trades at night”. We also unpack how Alchemy emerged from 16 prior “failed” products, what it really takes to build at extreme speed, and how banks can escape the proof‑of‑concept graveyard and move tokenization into production. Then we switch lenses to Usha’s story: a journey from commerce in Chennai to MIS in Texas to building Starnik and raising two founder‑CEOs. She shares practical parenting hacks, the rituals that kept the family grounded, and how to raise curious, kind and courageous children in a world of hyper‑connected ambition. Together, Nikil and Usha reflect on family as a “startup incubator”, ethics at the edge of money and health, and why – whether you are running a family, a startup or a bank – your values remain the ultimate operating system. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What happens when a commercial pilot obsessed with time value, a technologist who helped build Dell and Compaq in Asia, and a board-level strategist for some of the world’s most respected banks and insurers roll into one career?  In this episode of Money Majlis, Tokyo-based investor, general partner and board member Steve Monaghan joins Suvo in Dubai to map out a brutally honest, deeply practical view of where banking and insurance go next in the age of AI, quantum computing and streaming finance. Steve traces his unlikely journey from flying overnight milk runs and teaching himself Lotus 1-2-3 to building pricing models at Dell, early mobile payments at Citi, retail turnarounds in Japan, and major AI and data programmes at DBS and AIA. Along the way, he explains why trust is the ultimate currency and why it is backed not by gold, but by time. Time, in his world, is the hidden balance sheet that banks, insurers and regulators still don’t measure properly. The conversation dives into Steve’s famous framing of AI as an earthquake already shaking business models, and quantum computing as the coming tsunami that could blow up legacy cryptography and risk management much sooner than many boards expect. He is candid about why most corporate AI programmes are still “AI theatre” – pilots, dashboards and press releases with negligible P&L impact – and what it would take for banks to redesign their business models around optimisation, streaming capital and genuine customer value rather than just cost-cutting. Suvo and Steve also explore what an AI-competent, quantum-aware board really looks like, why GCC banks in markets like the UAE have a rare window to leapfrog, and how streaming finance – “money at the speed of information” – could help households pay off mortgages years earlier and turn idle working capital into a national productivity engine. From Apple’s negative cash conversion cycle to paycheck-to-paycheck workers trapped in batch-era salary systems, Steve argues that our operating system for money is no longer fit for purpose. If you care about the future of banking, digital regulation in the GCC, or what an AI-competent board should look like, this conversation will challenge many assumptions you still take for granted.  Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What happens when credit becomes invisible, intelligent and truly embedded into our daily lives? In this episode of Money Majlis, Suvo Sarkar sits down in Dubai with Gaurav Kumar (GK), founder and CEO of Indian unicorn Yubi, the AI-powered operating system for debt markets. Together they unpack how a company born in Chennai during the pandemic is quietly rewiring how money moves for consumers, MSMEs and banks from India to MENA, Southeast Asia and now the US. The conversation begins at 30,000 feet, with the global revolution in consumer and personal lending. GK explains why finance is no longer about walking into a bank branch or opening a banking app, but about credit showing up instantly and non-intrusively inside the storefronts where customers actually live: e-commerce checkouts, ride-hailing apps, dealer showrooms and payroll platforms. He breaks down how advances in digital identity, India’s public digital rails and AI-led underwriting now allow pre-approved loans to move in as little as 9–12 seconds, and why that changes the ethics, risks and responsibilities of lenders forever. From there, the discussion dives into India’s consumer credit boom and the unfinished business of financial inclusion. GK unpacks how India's household debt-to-GDP ratio of just 38% signals not prudence but enormous untapped potential, and why the next decade will see credit distributed far more evenly across a market that has historically served only thick-file, collateral-rich borrowers. He explains how Yubi’s architecture, co-lending rails and AI tools help banks serve these segments at lower cost while preserving prudence through explainable, auditable models and tighter bureau data cycles. Then there is the founder's story. Why he built through the pandemic, why he deliberately rejected the marketplace model to keep his allegiance to lenders, and why he has personally staked over $39 million of his own capital in Yubi — a signal of commitment to clients, not a funding shortfall. GK shares his near-death moments of self-doubt, his IRMA-rooted belief that access to finance should be a fundamental right, and his ambitions across the Middle East, Southeast Asia and the US, where Yubi already partners with more than 30 banks in MENA. Warm, candid and rich with insight, this is a masterclass for credit geeks, fintech founders, bankers and anyone curious about how money really moves behind the scenes. GK also reveals a hidden talent that catches even Suvo off guard. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What if the most powerful force in business is not capital, technology or strategy, but the simple human act of one person truly reaching another?  In this episode of Money Majlis, Suvo Sarkar is joined by Sally Susman – advisor, advocate and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of “Breaking Through: Communicating to Open Minds, Move Hearts and Change the World” – for a masterclass in how leaders can use words to move people, build trust and change outcomes in a world that is increasingly sceptical of institutions. For 18 years, Sally served as Executive Vice President and Chief Corporate Affairs Officer at Pfizer, guiding three CEOs through proxy battles, leadership transitions, political firestorms and the most scrutinised vaccine launch in modern history, after senior roles at American Express, Estée Lauder and in the Clinton administration. Together, Suvo and Sally explore why communication is not a “soft skill” but a rock‑hard competency that multiplies every other leadership skill, and why so many boards still underestimate its strategic value. Sally explains what separates game‑changing CEOs from the merely competent, how she built enduring partnerships with leaders like Albert Bourla, and what it really takes for a Chief Communications Officer to have the courage for candour while always serving the institution, not the individual ego. The conversation dives into the global trust deficit, the collapse of traditional media and the rise of hyperlocal, creator‑driven influence. Drawing on the COVID‑19 vaccine rollout, Sally shares what she learned about communicating under radical uncertainty, why facts alone rarely shift behaviour, and how barbers, grandmothers and college students sometimes move public opinion more than politicians or celebrities. She is frank about the temptations of silence, “greenhushing” and performative authenticity – and why all three are dead ends for modern leaders. In the final stretch, the episode becomes more intimate and reflective. Sally talks about the personal values that have guided her – courage, curiosity, empathy and a deep belief in equality – and how coming out to her family shaped a lifetime commitment to living and leading authentically. She reflects on the importance of humour, ritual and friendship in sustaining a high‑pressure career, her love of art, ideas and public life, and why, in her “Act III,” she is focused less on titles and more on mentoring, giving back and leaving the campsite better than she found it.  This is not just a conversation about corporate communication; it is a conversation about how to live, work and speak in a way that feels true. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner: Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What happens when one of India’s most successful private equity investors walks away at the peak of his career to spend the rest of his life building the country’s human capital?  In this episode of Money Majlis, Suvo sits down in New Delhi with Ashish Dhawan – founder of ChrysCapital, Ashoka University, Central Square Foundation and The Convergence Foundation – to unpack a remarkable journey from Wall Street returns to nation-building outcomes. Ashish reflects on India’s dramatic rise as a core allocation in global private equity, why buyouts and high-quality exits are finally deepening the market, and how global capital is rotating out of China and into India’s growth story without diluting discipline. He explains what it takes to generate real alpha in a crowded PE landscape, why the best firms are now judged as much on governance and institution-building as on IRR, and how private capital can be a quiet force for better managed, more ambitious Indian companies.  The conversation covers India’s next frontier: deep tech and human capital. Ashish lays out why India cannot become a developed country on apps alone, why the new deep-tech fund-of-funds architecture could be as catalytic as Israel’s Yozma moment, and which themes in biotech, semiconductors, AI and advanced manufacturing he finds genuinely investible over the next decade. In parallel, he argues that India’s true superpower is its people – 23 million births a year – and explains why fixing foundational literacy and numeracy, expanding quality skilling, enabling labour mobility and unlocking women’s economic participation will determine whether “Viksit Bharat” (or “Developed India”) becomes a reality or stays a rhetoric. Suvo and Ashish dive deep into the playbook behind The Convergence Foundation’s portfolio approach to nation-building, Central Square Foundation’s work on NIPUN Bharat and FLN at scale, and the bold experiment of Ashoka University as a collective-philanthropy, liberal arts-led “full university” rooted in Indian context yet globally benchmarked. Ashish is candid about the bumps on the road – from regulatory constraints in education and the debate over for-profit models to the tightrope of academic freedom and political reality – and shares the leadership lessons he would offer India’s new billionaires as they design their own philanthropy.   Along the way, we also meet the Kolkata schoolboy, the Ivy League dealmaker, the would-be travel guide and the relentless optimist who believes India can sustain China-style growth while remaining grounded in ancient wisdom and a renewed sense of purpose.  Produced by : Poddster Giving partner: Goodworld   Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What if one man’s voice could change the way we hear music, eat food and celebrate life?  In this special Money Majlis XTRA episode, Suvo Sarkar is joined by Padma Shri awardee Shankar Mahadevan, singer, composer, Grammy‑winning frontman of Shakti and co‑founder of the South Indian resto‑café brand Malgudi. Together they trace a remarkable journey from a Tamil Iyer childhood in Chembur and veena lessons at five, to becoming the “Shankar” of Shankar‑Ehsaan‑Loy and reshaping the sound of modern Hindi cinema with albums like Dil Chahta Hai and Kal Ho Naa Ho. Shankar opens up about the surreal moment of walking onto the Grammy stage with Shakti and why, for him, the biggest award is simply sharing a platform with maestros like John McLaughlin and Ustad Zakir Hussain. He revisits the making of Breathless, the three‑minute marvel that began as an experimental meter in a composer’s office and went on to become a generational anthem that refuses to age after twenty-seven years.  The conversation dives into craft and technology as Shankar reflects on how his early career as a software engineer now shapes his studio process, from composing inside a DAW to thinking of plug‑ins as creative partners. He explains how rigorous Carnatic and Hindustani training built the grammar that lets him move effortlessly between classical, film, fusion and folk, and why he believes folk music, born from life’s milestones, sits even “above” classical in its raw power. From there, Suvo steers the discussion into food and entrepreneurship. Shankar shares the manifestation story behind Malgudi, how a chance meeting with Chembur friend Ramakrishnan turned a foodie’s dream into a fast‑growing chain in Mumbai and Dubai, and why they obsessed over every element, from the exact texture of the idli to the signature Malgudi sambar and filter coffee. He reveals his plans to turn Malgudi into a cultural brand with live music, spiritual mornings and curated experiences that blend sound and flavour. Along the way, you will hear about his global tours, the healing power of music, his 15‑year‑old digital academy reaching students in 90‑plus countries, and his clear‑eyed view on AI as a powerful but ultimately subordinate tool in the creative process. This is an episode about excellence, humility and celebrating life, whether on stage, in the studio or over a hot dosa. Produced by : Poddster Giving partner: Goodworld   Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What does it really take to rebuild a bank from the inside out—without breaking it, and without losing what made it trusted in the first place?    In this episode of Money Majlis, Suvo Sarkar sits down with his former colleague and co‑architect of Emirates NBD’s transformation, Miguel Rio Tinto, Group Chief Digital and Information Officer at Emirates NBD. Together, they revisit an eight‑year journey that turned a commercially strong but technologically constrained bank into one of the region’s most advanced digital institutions, and now a live testbed for large‑scale AI in financial services.   Miguel takes us inside the AED 1 billion technology overhaul that rebuilt Emirates NBD on a cloud‑native, software‑defined foundation, from private cloud and consolidated core banking to a modern data platform and a 2,300‑strong engineering organisation working in cross‑functional tribes. He is candid about what went wrong along the way, including the tense August 2020 core migration in the middle of Covid, and the hard decisions the executive team had to make to sacrifice short‑term innovation for long‑term resilience. This is transformation without the PowerPoint gloss, told by the person who had to live with the risk every day.   The conversation delves into what Miguel calls the most striking technology wave of his career: generative and agentic AI. He explains how Emirates NBD is moving beyond pilots to industrialised AI, from sanctions screening and transaction monitoring to conversational servicing and large‑scale deployment of AI engineering tools that are already changing the economics of software development inside the bank. He is explicit about which roles may disappear, how productivity is being measured, and why he now trusts properly guided AI‑generated code more than traditional hand‑written code.   Suvo and Miguel also tackle open banking in the UAE, embedded finance and digital assets with unusual honesty. Miguel lays out why Emirates NBD wants to be both the region’s best embedded bank and its best direct‑to‑customer digital bank, how he thinks about tokenisation and stablecoins beyond the hype, and why ecosystem strategy only matters if it creates genuine network effects rather than a collection of pilots.   Finally, they zoom out to cybersecurity, regulation and the global leaderboard in banking technology. Miguel shares what keeps him up at night, what a modern threat model looks like and why he still believes well‑prepared incumbents will come out of the AI era stronger than they went in. It is a combination of ambition, humility and optimism—about UAE, about technology, and about banking’s ability to reinvent itself in the next decade—that makes this conversation both strategic and surprisingly human.   Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback Visa outsourcing is one of those invisible pipes of the global economy—critical to how we travel, work and study abroad, yet rarely understood as an industry in its own right. In this special episode of Money Majlis to celebrate the 25th anniversary of VFS Global, founder and CEO Zubin Karkaria takes us inside the company he conceptualised in 2001 and built into the world’s largest visa and citizen services platform, now handling over 100,000 applications a day and more than 500 million since inception.    From a pilot with the US consulate in Mumbai to a multi-billion dollar company with dual headquarters in Zurich and Dubai, Zubin’s story is part “Made in India” scale‑up, part UAE hub success, and all about building trust in one of the most sensitive parts of government infrastructure.   Suvo and Zubin explore the structural forces powering a fast‑growing market in outsourced visa services—rising leisure travel, a boom in students studying abroad, new mobility agreements, and the surprising resilience of in‑person business travel in an age of video calls. Zubin explains why only about a third of the world’s visas are currently outsourced and why that leaves a long runway for growth, from new source markets and emerging destinations that want tourism and talent without compromising security.   The conversation dives into the Middle East, where Dubai and the wider GCC have moved from “late adopters” to pioneers of public–private partnerships, from Emirates Airlines’ early outsourcing of visa services to today’s integrated medical, attestation, court and citizen service centres. Zubin shares how VFS built some of the world’s largest visa centres in the UAE, and why the region’s ease of doing business and talent pool make it a natural control tower for a network that now spans more than 160 countries.   Technology and AI run as a powerful thread throughout the episode. Zubin outlines why AI for VFS is “an article of faith”, how they built responsible‑AI guardrails before deploying their own models, and the concrete use cases that are already transforming the experience for both applicants and consular officers. Yet he is equally clear about the non‑negotiables: VFS never takes visa decisions, data is pushed in real time to sovereign systems, and rigorous purging and privacy controls define how the company handles millions of identities every year.   Zubin reflects on culture as a competitive moat, his belief that integrity is non‑negotiable, and why he created a chief culture officer role to hard‑wire values across nationalities. In a more personal vein, he looks back at his days as a young Parsi boy serving as a Dasturji during the Muktad prayer period, and how the Zoroastrian triad of “good thoughts, good words, good deeds” still guides him to stay calm, reflective and purpose‑driven under pressure.    Production partner : Poddster Giving partner: Goodworld   All past episodes and details of the Money Majlis giving movement can be viewed on www.moneymajlis.com.

Please visit moneymajlis.com to share your feedback What happens when one of the world’s most respected AI entrepreneurs sits down with a veteran banker to talk about the future of work, banking, and inclusion in the age of intelligent machines? In this episode of Money Majlis, Suvo is joined by Dr Ayesha Khanna, co‑founder and CEO of Addo and founder of the new education and media platform Amplify, to explore how AI is moving from hype to hard results in boardrooms, smart cities, and everyday careers.   Across a wide‑ranging conversation, Ayesha shares the pivotal moments that shaped her journey from building data‑driven trading systems on Wall Street to advising Fortune 500 CEOs and governments on AI strategy and governance, and now to creating role‑specific AI learning journeys for professionals around the world. She explains why only a small minority of organisations manage to escape “pilot purgatory,” how the best banks are turning AI into tangible gains in risk, compliance, and customer experience within 12–18 months, and what practical guardrails boards and regulators need to put in place to stay ambitious without being reckless.   The episode digs into Ayesha’s core belief that the purpose of AI is to amplify human potential, not replace it. She argues that critical thinking and domain expertise will matter more, not less, as AI diffuses through financial services, and lays out how leaders should redesign talent strategies so people can confidently challenge and supervise AI, rather than blindly follow it. She looks ahead five years to paint a vivid picture of how a typical banker, risk manager, or product manager will actually work alongside intelligent assistants in a “Hybrid Age” of human‑AI teamwork.   A powerful part of the discussion centres on women and under‑represented groups in technology. Ayesha reflects on more than a decade of work with 21st Century Girls and now Amplify’s programs for mid‑career women, sharing moving stories of girls who discovered their confidence in a coding class and women who have transitioned into AI‑enabled roles. She also offers concrete ideas for policymakers and corporations in Asia to shift from inspirational campaigns to systemic change.   Whether you are a bank CEO, fintech founder, or a 40‑something professional wondering how to future‑proof your career, this conversation will leave you with a clear message: do not wait for the future of work to happen to you; design it yourself, with AI as your partner, and make sure you bring others along.    If you believe AI should enlarge human potential rather than diminish it, this conversation will feel like a clear-eyed, warm-hearted call to action.   Visit moneymajlis.com to join our giving movement and get your USD 50 complimentary GiveCard.    Produced by : Poddster Giving partner : Goodworld