ABOUT
A thought-leader and change-maker, Krishna Omkar is the founder of Return on Equity, and is at the forefront of bridging the worlds of the private sector and civil society. Krishna counsels boards of directors, C-suite executives, and corporations on creating equitable outcomes and long-term sustainable growth. A corporate lawyer by training with over a decade of experience, Krishna has advised on matters spanning more than 60 jurisdictions and over US$200 billion in value. Also a globally-recognised thought-leader on stakeholder capitalism, purpose, impact, ESG, and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, Krishna is using his background in law, philosophy, and social sciences to situate stakeholder capitalism within the narrative of fiduciary duty and corporate governance, positing a business model that harnesses the power of inclusion, impact, empowerment, and social change as a strategy for long-term sustainable profitability, with the aim of doing “Better Business for Greater Good”.
CREDENTIALS
In 2023, the UK and Indian governments named Krishna one of 75 recipients of the UK-India Achievers Honours to mark 75 years of India’s independence. In 2022, Krishna was appointed a Fellow of St George’s House Windsor Castle, a group of 250 global leaders founded by HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, to advance leadership and dialogue on critical contemporary issues. In 2021, he was named by Attitude as one of 101 Trailblazers Changing the World, alongside the CEO of Apple, Tim Cook, Secretary Pete Buttigieg, and Pulitzer Prize winner Jericho Brown, and elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. He has been named a Future Leader by the Financial Times, named 2018 Role Model of the Year by Stonewall, received a 2019 Asian Achievers Award, and named to The Guardian’s Pride Power List in 2021 and 2022. For his legal work, Krishna received the inaugural Rising Star Award in the 2019 British Legal Awards, and was recommended as a leading lawyer in Legal 500 UK 2022 for Premium/$500 million+ M&A, and Legal 500 Asia Pacific 2020 and 2021.
IMPACT
In 2020, Krishna convened a round table of CEOs at the World Economic Forum in Davos, to discuss the role of corporations in effecting social change (see: here). In 2019, he spoke at the World Economic Forum alongside CEOs, philanthropists, and civil society leaders on the question of the role of the business sector in advancing inclusion and equality. A lawyer by training, at the invitation of the UN Assistant Secretary General, Krishna co-convened a 2019 UN consultation on business sector and civil society engagement, and also advised pro bono in the successful 2018 appeal to decriminalize same sex relations in India, collaborating with lead counsel and writing a brief referred to in the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment. In December 2021, Krishna spoke on ESG and stakeholder capitalism at the Novartis stakeholder conference, alongside Vas Narasimhan, CEO of Novartis, Lord Nick Hurd, Chair of the G7 Impact Taskforce, and Sir Ronald Cohen (see: here). He is also a founding member of McKinsey’s The Alliance, a by-invitation global network of leaders from prominent public, private, and social sector institutions and co-leads its project on Social Acceptance aimed at driving social equality and inclusion in the workplace.
NON-EXECUTIVE ROLES
Krishna is a Non-Executive Director of Copperfield Education, a portfolio company that operates Copperfield International School Verbier, the world’s first and only ski-in, ski-out International Baccalaureate® school. He also serves on the Boards of Human Rights First, a non-partisan U.S. advocacy and action organization that for 40 years has worked to press governments and private companies to respect human rights and the rule of law, and Athlete Ally, a U.S. based non-profit advocating for inclusion in sport that was behind the amendment of the Olympic Charter to include sexual orientation and gender identity as a protected characteristic, and was part of the consultation on the International Olympic Committee’s new framework for human rights, announced in 2021. He also serves on the Board of ORAM: Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Migration, and is a trustee of Queer Britain, the world’s first national LGBTQ+ museum, which opened its doors in London’s King’s Cross in May 2022. Krishna is also a trustee of the UK charity Paintings in Hospitals, now in its 63rd year as a unique institution delivering art-based interventions in healthcare settings.
EDUCATION
Krishna graduated with a First Class BA Honours in English Literature from St Stephen’s College, Delhi, and an M.Phil. from Merton College, University of Oxford. He has also spent time as visiting researcher at the Institut d'études politiques de Paris / SciencesPo Paris.
EXPERIENCE
During his career as a lawyer, Krishna has quarterbacked some of the most innovative and complex global matters in recent years, spanning more than 60 jurisdictions and over US$200 billion in aggregate value.
Cross-Border M&A
He has led a range of sophisticated cross-border deals, including acting for Western Union in its landmark investment in stc Pay, valuing stc Pay at US$1.3 billion and creating the first Middle Eastern Fintech Unicorn (see: Reuters, Forbes); advising Blackstone on its investment in Diligent, valuing Diligent at US$4 billion (see: Wall Street Journal); acting on the acquisition by BlackRock LTPC of Creed, following seven generations of family ownership (see: Bloomberg); acting for Non-Standard Finance in arrangements relating to its £1.3 billion hostile takeover offer for Provident (see: Sky News, Financial Times); acting for Brookfield Infrastructure Group in relation to its acquisition from AT&T of 32 internet data centres in 12 countries on 5 continents in a deal worth US$ 1.1 billion (see: BusinessWire); acting for Cerberus on its first transaction in the Middle East, through a co-investment with Olive Rock Partners in United Eastern Medical Services (see: Bloomberg); acting for Mark Newton-Jones in his reinstatement as CEO of Mothercare plc, an unprecedented step for a UK public company (see: Sky News, The Independent); acting for GlaxoSmithKline on its major three-part inter-conditional transaction with Novartis worth US$20 billion (see: Reuters, Bloomberg); and for Diageo in its two-part acquisition of a controlling stake in India’s United Spirits Limited (see: New York Times, Bloomberg, CNN, CNBC).
Special Situations
Krishna also has extensive experience advising financial sponsors, especially in special situations, including acting for: the Prudential Insurance Company of America and associated Prudential entities in relation to a package of financial and operational restructuring of the Pizza Hut UK Group, safeguarding over 5,000 jobs (see: Sky News); the board of Eddie Stobart in its highly publicised rescue in 2019, without which the UK supply-chain would have collapsed in the lead-in to Christmas (see: BBC, Financial Times); KKR Credit Advisers in relation to a variety of special situations investments and private equity funds focused on rescue financing; Blackstone Credit in a series of private credit, preferred equity, and special situations transactions; and Seadrill Limited, one of the world’s largest offshore drilling contractors, on a US$1.6 billion restructuring plan with prearranged chapter 11 cases, and the ring-fencing of its non-consolidated affiliates from its restructuring.
Corporate Governance, Risk, Bet-the-Company Matters
Krishna has also counselled some of the world's leading financial institutions on the corporate governance aspects of multi-jurisdictional investigations, including acting for: JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. in relation to regulatory and criminal investigations into the foreign exchange markets (see: Reuters, Wall Street Journal, The Guardian); Standard Chartered Bank in long running Iran sanctions investigations by UK and U.S. authorities (see: The New York Times, The Financial Times, BBC); and Deutsche Bank in its settlements with the FCA, DOJ, CFTC, and DFS in global regulatory investigations into the settling of LIBOR (see: New York Times, Wall Street Journal). He has also spent six months on secondment to Moody’s, where he advised on governance and compliance issues arising from engagement with regulators, including direct interface with ESMA.