Arun Balakrishnan

Arun Balakrishnan built his career around entrepreneurship and leadership. He has more than 15 years of experience launching and leading start-ups in the insurance sector. He is passionate about promoting innovation and transformation in the insurance industry, which he believes to be a key element of societies and economies.

Arun’s first foray into entrepreneurship was founding an online insurance aggregation start-up in India This experience was relevant for his next role, launching Indian insurance operations as CEO of Berkshire Hathaway India. He held this role until Berkshire Hathaway exited the Indian market in 2013. Arun viewed this change as an opportunity to dive more specifically into the industry, and in conjunction with two other Berkshire alums, co-founded Xceedance in 2013.  In 2015, he re-located the company’s headquarters to Boston, MA where he serves as the company’s Chairman & CEO. In addition to leading Xceedance he is also an active investor in start-ups either directly as an angel investor or as a limited partner in multiple venture capital firms.

Arun graduated with a bachelor’s degree in nautical sciences from Mumbai University and completed his master’s degree in business administration at the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad.