Sandhya Devanathan

Throughout the past year, Sandhya Devanathan has expanded Meta’s AI ambitions in India while taking on the additional responsibility of leading the company’s Southeast Asia business. She has positioned India as one of Meta’s most strategic AI markets, highlighting the country’s second-largest developer community and thriving startup ecosystem as key drivers of global AI innovation.

Since he took charge, Meta has doubled down on open-source AI through the Llama ecosystem, accelerated AI adoption across WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook, and expanded business messaging, with Click-to-WhatsApp revenues and WhatsApp Payments witnessing strong growth.

Devanathan has consistently argued that India will not just adopt AI but help shape its future. She has repeatedly advocated for open-source AI as a way to democratise innovation, enabling startups, enterprises and developers to build locally relevant applications faster. Her view is that India’s combination of engineering talent, entrepreneurship and digital public infrastructure uniquely positions it to become a global AI leader.