Top 10 Business Personalities of 2012

8. Ajay Banga
President and CEO of MasterCard
Ajaypal Singh Banga was born into a Sikh family in Pune, Maharashtra in India. The family's origin is from Jalandhar in Punjab. He grew up and schooled across India, successively in Secunderabad, Jalandhar, Delhi, Hyderabad and in Shimla, where he finished his schooling. He went on to graduate with a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree in Economics from St. Stephen's College, Delhi University and MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad

Banga began his business career with Nestle in 1981, Banga spent the next 13 years working in simple jobs spanning sales, marketing, and general management. He later joined Pepsico and was involved in the launch of its international fast food franchises in India as the economy liberalized.

Prior to joining MasterCard and getting elected as the CEO in July 2010, Banga spent 13 years at Citigroup from 1996 as part of the bank's senior management in the United States and Europe, Middle East, Africa regions before becoming chairman and chief executive officer of Citi's international global consumer group in 2005.

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