TiE Lifetime Award goes to Bill Gates

Hyderabad: Microsoft founder Bill Gates was Thursday conferred TiE lifetime achievement award. Receiving the award virtually during TiE Global Summit, he said it was honour to receive this prestigious award from TiE. In his remarks on the occasion, he said innovation is the key to solve the world's toughest challenges, whether it is stopping a pandemic, avoiding a climate disaster or just raising human productivity.

"But as Paul Allen and I experienced with Microsoft, innovators can't make it on their own. They need supporters and partners to make sure that their best ideas make it from the lab to the marketplace. For over 27 years, TiE has been doing just that. You support great entrepreneurs around the world and in some of the most important fields in technology today. Your work is essential in fostering innovation and creating the better world we all want."

As a first-generation entrepreneur, Bill Gates has created a remarkable impact not only on the global economy but also has become an inspiration to many many entrepreneurs through generations, said Mahavir Sharma, TiE Global Chair. Bill Gates is a visionary entrepreneur who has overcome various challenges and failures to create a new world, and he has leveraged success to tackle health and poverty issues worldwide which are overlooked by society, said Sridhar Pinnapureddy, TGS2020 Chair.

The lifetime achievement service award was posthumously conferred on late FC Kohli, father of Indian IT Industry, and the lifetime achievement family business transformation on Bill Marriott of Marriott International. Kohli was the founder and first CEO of Tata Consultancy Services, India's largest software services company. He died recently. His wife received the award and thanked TiE for choosing him for the award.

TiE also presented 10 awards under various categories. Six outstanding entrepreneurs and seven ecosystem players were recognised. The Singapore government was given the award for the best government agency supporting startup ecosystem. Best corporate supporting entrepreneurship went to Google/Alphabet for start-ups. Stanford University was recognised as the best university promoting entrepreneurship.

Best accelerator award was conferred on Y Combinator, best performing global VC Fund went to Sequoia Capital, and the most active angel network in the world award went to Tech Coast Angels. Bootstrapped to Billions award has gone to Ben Chestnut and rapid listing award to VIR Biotechnology, lightening unicorn award to Indigo Agriculture and most innovative startup to Data Robot.