Dr. Anand Deshpande is the Founder, Chairman and Managing Director of Persistent Systems Limited. Persistent Systems is a global Company with more than 23,000 employees in 18 countries. The Company is listed in BSE, NSE and is expected to cross a Billion Dollars in revenue this financial year.

Anand holds a Bachelor of Technology (B. Tech.) with Honours (Hons.) in Computer Science and Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur, and an M.S. and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA. He has been recognized by both his alma maters — as a Distinguished Alumnus in 2012 by IIT Kharagpur and by the School of Informatics of Indiana University with the Career Achievement Award in 2007.

Prior to founding Persistent Systems, Anand began his professional career at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in Palo Alto, California, where he worked as Member of Technical Staff from May 1989 to October 1990.

Over his career, he has served numerous positions at various professional and non-profit organizations, prominent being, founding trustee of Persistent Foundation, NASSCOM’s Executive Council, SEAP (Software Exporters’ Association of Pune) and Pune Chapter of CSI (Computer Society of India), CII’s Pune Zonal Council. Part-time member of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), Vice President of the Mahratta Chamber of Commerce Industries and Agriculture (MCCIA), founding President of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) India, Trustee in the Computer History Museum, founding member of iSPIRT.