Each of these executives displayed, in his or her own way, a unique ability to build a leadership team, long-term thinking, and to make bold decisions during the chaos of 2020.
CEO: Tor Kristian Gyland
Company: Green Mountain
Location: Norway
Big data has taken over the business world, showing just how dependent today’s processes are on effective digital solutions and the data centres that house them. The industry is booming, no doubt about it, but like every industry, concerns for its CO2 footprint are high. Cloud providers require more and more data capacity, and they want it green. Tor has taken advantage of Norway’s abundant renewable energy and has created the world’s greenest data centre.
CEO: Sarbari Gupta
Company: Electrosoft Services, Inc.
Location: USA
Gupta has been recognised for her accomplishments with Electrosoft with the U.S. Women’s Chamber of Commerce Stellar Award and the FedHealthIT Impact Award, to name but a few. Having established a special niche in the cybersecurity realm, Electrosoft itself was selected for the sixth time for an appearance on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies in America. Gupta is currently aiming the focus of the company on three important technologies: cloud-based security monitoring, enterprise management solutions with smart card authentication, and derived credentials for mobile platforms. Electrosoft has a goal of $50 million in annual revenue by 2022, and with the right acquisition, it looks easily achievable.
CEO: Hjalmar Ståhlberg Nordegren
Company: Karma
Location: Sweden
Nobody likes to waste food, but until Nordegren founded Karma in 2016, the notion of giving food waste any value was hard to fathom. Karma partners with restaurants to sell their leftover food on its app. Consumers get great food at half price or less and the feel-good factor of reducing waste. Restaurants reduce their carbon footprint and get money for food that would otherwise be wasted. Today, the Karma app already has over 1 million users and has prevented more than 1,200 tonnes of food from going to the landfill.
CEO: Igor Shekhterman
Company: X5 Retail Group
Location: Russia
A multi-format retailer, X5 Retail Group develops and manages a portfolio of brands, each with a distinct value to Russian consumers. As the pandemic spread, the company had to take urgent measures for the safety of employees and customers while meeting unprecedented demand for its services and changing consumer preferences. X5 managed to keep the shelves stocked and operations running smoothly thanks to robust business processes and a strategic transformation to digital services that was fast-tracked to completion during the peak lockdown period.
CEO: Muharrem Usta
Company: MLP Care
Location: Turkey
A pharmaceutical company, MLP Care has, along with the entire industry, taken a defensive crisis management position to minimise the destructive impact of the pandemic. The approach MLP Care took was unique in that they were an active participant in Covid-19 diagnosis and treatment processes while actively campaigning to reduce the spread of the virus through public information distributed by its senior physicians. Aggressive investment in technology over the last two years has bolstered MLP Care’s Covid-19 testing capabilities, especially concerning patients with chronic diseases. MLP Care has a goal of launching an AI center of excellence to take its clinical skills to an even higher level in the future.
