Asia’s richest banker Uday Kotak might be grooming his son Jay Kotak for a top job at his bank

• Jay Kotak, the son of Asia’s richest banker Uday Kotak and the VP of Kotak Mahindra Bank, was formally introduced to investors and analysts at a recent event, five years after joining the bank.
• Jay Kotak is currently the co-head of Kotak’s neobank platform 811 and he is being groomed for a top role at Kotak Mahindra Bank.

The youngest working generation of India, Gen Z could all be about getting away with doing less. Not for Jay Kotak, the eldest son of Uday Kotak, Asia’s richest banker.

“Comfortable mediocrity is a common aspiration in today's youth. Our parents and grandparents lived in tougher times - creating a social contract that admired success,” he said in a very popular tweet.

Jay however is burdened much more than any of his peers. His father is the chairman of India’s third largest private bank - Kotak Mahindra Bank. Soon, he might be filling his father’s large shoes as the senior Kotak has recently introduced his eldest son to investors and analysts formally.

Jay Kotak has been working at the bank for the last five years after he graduated from Harvard. His outspoken personality and sense of humour has manifested itself into a regular toon inspired from him, called Jay Speaks in Business Standard. The Kotak family owns the business newspaper.

McKinsey - Goldman Sachs - Kotak Mahindra Bank

Jay Kotak completed his MBA at Harvard Business School in 2017 and has a BA in history from Columbia University. After a short consulting stint at McKinsey and an internship at Goldman Sachs in New York, Jay joined Kotak Investment Bank in 2017.

Two years later, junior Kotak started working with his father’s team at Kotak Mahindra Bank in retail banking business as executive assistant to Shanti Ekambaram, group president of the consumer bank.

After the pandemic, when many businesses moved online, Jay joined Kotak’s 811 team. He was appointed to co-head the neobank division with Manish Agarwal, business head of Kotak 811.

Kotak's 811 app draws its name from November 8, the day in 2016 when the government announced demonetisation and cancelled 86% of all rupees in circulation.

Next in the line?

After he was formally introduced, talk of succession planning at the Kotak Bank has been doing the rounds. Uday Kotak’s tenure at the bank comes to an end in December 2023.

KVS Manian, head of corporate, institutional and investment banking; and Shanti Ekambaram, group president of consumer banking, are known to be competing for the top job at Kotak Mahindra Bank, as per media reports.

But most people now believe that Jay Kotak is also being groomed for a top position, if not that of an MD, at the bank. If he is appointed to a top position at the bank, he would be inheriting one of India’s top private lending banks worth $44.8 billion as per Forbes.

Executives in the investment meeting said that Jay’s progress will depend on merit but India’s businesses like to keep operational control within the family. The 63-year-old Uday Kotak is the richest banker in Asia with a wealth of $15.1 billion, according to Forbes. He kickstarted a financial consultancy to provide cheap loans to companies at the age of 23, which later grew into a bank in 2003.