At 83, yet another big exit for Soota

Bengaluru: At 83, Ashok Soota has struck again — selling his 22.1% stake in Happiest Minds to ITC Infotech for Rs 1,330 crore, as part of a merger that will bring the Bengaluru-based IT services company into the ITC fold. The octogenarian may be beginning to look a little frail, but those who know him say he remains as astute as ever. It’s not clear what he plans to do with the money he gets from this transaction, but much of his recent focus has been on health initiatives.Four years ago, when he was 79, Soota launched his third venture, Happiest Health. The idea was to build it into something akin to WebMD, the American health information portal. The venture today also includes diagnostics and clinics.He has also created an overarching holding trust and a medical research trust, designed to co-exist and survive in perpetuity. He had previously committed Rs 200 crore towards a not-for-profit entity called Skan focused on ageing and neurological research. For that, he has two major partners, both in Bengaluru – the Centre for Brain Research (CBR) at Indian Institute of Science (IISc), and St John’s Geriatric Centre (SJGC). Some of the funds will also go to IIT-Roorkee, and the mental health institute Nimhans.Soota studied engineering at IIT Roorkee and was at Shriram Refrigeration Industries when Azim Premji hired him in 1985 to build Wipro’s then nascent IT business. Over the next 14 years, Soota became almost the face of Wipro.In 1999, when he was 56, Soota co-founded Mindtree. Ten IT industry professionals from Wipro, Lucent and Cambridge Technology Partners came together, pooling $1.6 million. Two decades later, Mindtree was sold to L&T for more than $2 billion. But Soota had exited the company prior to that, in 2011, following differences with other co-founders.He went on to found Happiest Minds when he was 68. In 2020, Happiest Minds’ Rs 700-crore IPO was oversubscribed 150 times.Soota has cited Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffett as a role model for maintaining an active work life. “It doesn’t mean I will necessarily work as long as he will. I might even have different roles going forward,” he told TOI in 2021.Get the latest Business News and Live updates. Download the TOI app.