Numero uno
Rankings of countries, institutions, companies and individuals

Best employer for multicultural women
Two American corporate giants Citigroup and PepsiCo have made it to the list of best employers for multicultural women. Evaluating the presence and prominence of coloured women in the US corporate world, the list of 20 companies has been drawn up by US-based Working Mother magazine. Interestingly, the two business groups are led by India-born chief executives. Beverages major PepsiCo is led by Chennai-born Indra Nooyi while banking gaint Citigroup is led by Nagpur-born Vikram Pandit.

According to the magazine, PepsiCo has about 10 per cent employees who are ‘women of colour’, with seven per cent of them in the executives/managers. On the other hand, Citigroup has a higher representation of women of colour in its ranks, making up 22 per cent of the total employees. However, when it comes to executives or managers, there is only about four per cent of such people. Other prominent names in the ‘2008 Working Mother best companies for multicultural women’ list include Colgate-Palmolive, with 13 per cent, Credit Suisse with 14 per cent, Deloitte with 16 per cent, Ernst & Young with 17 per cent, IBM with 8 per cent, MetLife with 14 per cent, PricewaterhouseCoopers with 16 per cent and Wal-Mart with 20 per cent.

Top reputed companies
Diversified Indian conglomerate Tata group has emerged as the world’s sixth most reputed company, according to world’s best corporate reputations’ list, compiled by US-based Reputation Institute. Tata group leapfrogged over 100 positions from last year’s 124th rank in the annual ‘Global 200: The global list, which includes 10 other Indian companies, has been topped by Japanese auto maker Toyota, followed by US-based internet search giant Google, Sweden’s Ikea, Italy’s Ferrero and another American firm Johnson & Johnson.

Ratan Tata-led group is joined by India’s technology giant Infosys Technologies, which occupied 14th position. Nine other Indian firms, which were among 600 companies considered in a survey to prepare the list, made it to the final 200. These firms include Mukesh Ambani-led RIL, ICICI Bank, Bharti Airtel, BSNL, Wipro, Birla group’s Grasim Industries, tobacco-to-consumer goods conglomerate ITC, oil refining and marketing major BPCL and national carrier Air India Ltd.

Sunil Mittal gets USIBC Global Vision award
The US-India Business Council (USIBC), premier business advocacy organisation of United States and India, honoured Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman and group CEO, Bharti Enterprises, with the Global Vision award. The award was conferred in recognition of Mittal’s “revolutionary foresight in bringing telecom connectivity to benefit the lives of the common man, for his entrepreneurial zeal, and for his efforts to organise India’s agricultural sector. The award was given during the 33rd anniversary Global Partnership Summit of USIBC in Washington, DC. Previous recipients of the award include Jim McNerney, chairman and CEO of Boeing, Ratan Tata and Mukesh Ambani.

Yes Bank tanks global recognition
Yes Bank has won the Emerging Markets Sustainable Bank of the Year Award 2008 for Asia constituted by The Financial Times and the International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank group. YES bank won the award for excellence in creating environmental, social and financial value in its operations in India. Another Asian bank to register its presence at the awards category for the third time was Bangladesh’s ASA, a micro-finance institution, which won the newly-constituted Bottom of the Pyramid award.

Banco Real, Brazil, was named overall winner in the Sustainable Bank of the Year Award. Sustainable Investor of the Year Award went to the US based E Plus Co. The company invests in small and medium sized enterprises providing clean energy technology in Africa, Asia and Latin America.