Suraj is a trusted business advisor with over 11 years of professional experience including +23 audit busy seasons, serving on complex engagements for private companies in a broad range of industries, specializing in healthcare, real estate, alternative investments, and manufacturing. As an audit leader, Suraj’s experience includes financial reporting, researching and resolving technical audit and accounting issues, decision making, and project coordination. Suraj has a strong interest in healthcare finance, disruption, and the advancement of value based care. Regarding extracurricular activities, Suraj serves as the President of the Ascend Greater Atlanta chapter, and Chair of the Finance Committee and Board member for Odyssey Family Counseling Center. Suraj attended the University of Georgia and earned a BBA in Accounting in 2007 and MAcc in 2008. He has served as a CPA since 2009. He was accredited as a Fellow in the Healthcare Financial Management Association in 2017.

Areas of expertise:

-        Team leadership

-        Complex technical accounting research

-        Budget and contract management

-        Risk assessment

-        Healthcare delivery process and changing reimbursement models

-        Internal control over financial and quality reporting

-        Maintenance of client business relationships

-        Inclusion and diversity issues

-        Coordination with valuation, actuarial, and information technology specialists

Ashish Gupta is vice president and chief information officer (CIO) for NextEra Energy, Inc. He has

corporate responsibility for all aspects of the company’s information technology, including strategy,

driving digital transformation, and leading information and operations technology initiatives. He

joined NextEra Energy in 2017 and is a member of the company’s Operating Committee.

Prior to joining NextEra Energy, Ashish was the chief information officer for GE Energy Connections.

During his more than 20-year tenure at General Electric Company (GE), Ashish held CIO positions

at GE Capital and GE Energy. Ashish moved to Atlanta, Georgia, to lead the organization,

consolidation and setup of Global Infrastructure Services for GE Energy. In 2003, Ashish was named

CIO for the Transmission & Distribution business. Subsequently, he was CIO for Parts & Repair

Services and for Power Generation Services in 2010. Ashish has been recognized for his leadership

and ability to consistently create broad, innovative strategies to leverage technology for competitive

advantage, drive business productivity and growth.

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Ashish is a six-sigma certified black belt. He has a bachelor's degree in commerce, a master's

degree in commerce and accounting, and a post-graduate diploma in computer application.

Ashish was recognized in 2009 with CIO Magazine’s CIO 100 honorees and in 2012 by CIO-Asia

Magazine CIO 100 honorees. He also received Computerworld’s 2015 Premier 100 Technology

Leaders award for the positive impact he has on his organization through technology.

Fahim Siddiqui is senior vice president of Technology Development at The Home Depot. Fahim and his team are focused on the Online, Marketing, Merchandising and Supply Chain functions. Their goal is to create and support technology platforms that provide an interconnected and seamless experience across the business for both customers and associates.

Before joining The Home Depot in late 2018, Fahim sent more than three decades developing expertise in the retail, energy and telecom sectors. He served in technology leadership roles at Staples, Vidhyo, Intralinks, Serenity (founder), K2 Software, MCI, Time Warner and Sprint. Most recently, he was senior vice president - engineering, cloud & operations at Staples, where he was responsible for the commerce and digital platform and led the digital transformation across marketing, sales, merchandising, order management, supply chain and customer service systems.

Fahim holds an executive MBA from Brown University, a master’s in computer science from the University of Missouri and a bachelor’s degree from Iowa State University.

Peggy is an audit partner at PwC. She serves clients in various sectors including industrial products and manufacturing, engineering and construction, technology, medical devices, clinical research organizations, and wholesale distributions. In addition to serving her clients, Peggy invests her energy on driving diversity and inclusion priorities. She co-leads PwC's US national Pan Asian Inclusion Network, focusing on creating an inclusive and caring working environment. Peggy serves as the President for Ascend Charlotte Professional Chapter.

Dr.  Attavar is a Consultant Psychiatrist working in the National Health Services in the United Kingdom. Dr.  Attavar’s speciality is Developmental Disorders, Autism , Depression and Anxiety management.  He is the regional representative (Oxford)  for intellectual disabilities at the Royal College of Psychiatry . Dr. Attavar qualified in India and has worked at psychiatric training rotations in North and South London .  Dr. Attavar has been working as a Consultant Psychiatrist since 2007 in Buckinghamshire and had various publications and research articles .

Dr Nila Kasianandan is a General Practitioner in Australia and a trainee specialising towards Fellowship in Psychiatry. Hailing from a community that experienced trauma from ethnical conflicts and realising the importance of Intergenerational trauma among the traumatised migrants, she advocates towards breaking the mental health stigma among the Tamil community.

Mr. Bhakta presently serves as national trustee and past president of Shree Ramkabir Bhakta Samaj of USA, a community of 4000+ families (14000 members) migrated from India, UK, Africa and Panama, Saint Kabir followers, mostly vegetarian and self employed professionals, hoteliers, business owners.  Mr. Bhakta was recently elected as regional director of the region of The Greater Los Angeles Area of AAHOA, an association of 20,000 hoteliers across the country.  Father of two daughters, hotel owner and president of All4lodging.com

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Sid has 25 years of professional experience in Sales , Client Relationships & Operations . Sid currently leads key client relationship within Consumer Sector at IBM . Before Joining IBM, he has served as a Vice President for Accenture and held Sales Leadership roles with large consulting firms like TCS & Wipro in his professional career. He has led & executed Business Strategy, Machine Learning , Robotics ,Blockchain, ERP & Outsourcing initiatives with many clients.
He has worked with clients in 20 plus countries helping execute large transformation projects across Business Operations. Sid has participated in various panel discussions & industry forums and has written papers on Business Transformation, Supply Chain, E commerce in consumer industry .
 

Sid has done his MBA from University of Poona in India and Completed Leadership & Strategy program from Wharton Business School at University of Pennsylvania. He is a Certified Practitioner of Design Thinking & Agile Methods from IBM . Sid is a volunteer with “American Corporate Partners” and Mentor Veterans on Higher education and Corporate Jobs and culture.
 

Sid lives in Atlanta with his Wife and a Golden retriever “ Magic “ . His son has recently Graduated from University of Georgia and pursuing his career as an Entrepreneur.
Life Philosophy : “Do not fear failure but rather fear not trying.”