Former Managing Director of Facebook (Meta) India, Kirthiga Reddy, was the guest speaker at the FICCI Ladies Organisation (FLO)’s inspiring session titled ‘Growth Code’ held at District 150 by Quorum, Knowledge City, Madhapur. Over 150 FLO members attended the event that continued till late evening on Tuesday.

Opening remarks by FLO Chairperson

Opening the session, Ms Prathibha Kunda, Chairperson of FLO, said the event was designed around two defining questions:

1. “What is the future demanding from women leaders?”

2. “And who is someone who has already lived that future before the world saw it?”

She highlighted the urgency: with 75% of the global workforce needing new digital skills by the end of this decade, and women holding only 18% of leadership roles in technology, the challenge lies not in capability but in opportunity and awareness.

“Leaders adapt to change — but visionaries arrive before it begins. Kirthiga Reddy is that rare force of foresight,” she said.

Kirthiga Reddy’s core advice on AI

Speaking on the power and pitfalls of artificial intelligence, Ms Reddy told the audience:

“Use AI. Rely on it. But always double-check it,” she advised the 150-plus women at the session.

Her remarkable journey

From Nanded to Silicon Valley, Kirthiga Reddy shared her extraordinary path: childhood across Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu due to her father’s transferable job, becoming a Stanford graduate, and later serving as Chair of the Stanford Business Management Board.

“People who know me may not know that I am a Telugu woman. Moving across states early in life taught me adaptability and agility,” she said.

She recalled joining Facebook as its first employee in India when it was still a young company.

“It was a futuristic product with a future full of promise — so I grabbed the opportunity,” she said. Despite being a product leader by background, she took on operational responsibilities and grew the India operations.

Transformative impact of technology

Ms Reddy shared powerful anecdotes:

A woman once told her, “I don’t use the internet… but I am on Facebook.”

“This showed me that people don’t care about the technology — they care about what it does for them,” she said.

Another story featured a domestic worker who, despite being unable to read or write, used Facebook effortlessly and joyfully.

“Our mission was always to give people the power to share.”

Current roles and AI Kiran initiative

After Facebook, Kirthiga became CEO & Co-Founder of Verix, the first female investing partner at SoftBank’s $130B Vision Fund, and Founder of AI Kiran — a large-scale movement to empower Indian women in Artificial Intelligence.

Supported by NASSCOM, Aspire For Her, Youth Ki Awaaz, Karya, AnitaB.org, SheTO and others, AI Kiran aims to reach 1 million women in the next year through mentoring, learning programmes, and leadership opportunities. “AI Kiran is about recognising and nurturing future women leaders in AI — and doing it at scale,” she said.

Personal influences and investment philosophy

Though a role model for thousands, Ms Reddy credited her mother as her greatest influence and recalled her daughter telling her that “inspiration must come from within.”

When asked what she looks for in founders before investing, she listed three qualities:

1. A bold vision,

2. An obsession to solve a real problem, and

3. Something uniquely Indian in the solution