Saugata Banerjee is the global Head of Sustainable Programming at EssilorLuxottica. Reporting to the Deputy CEO, he spearheads the creation of sustainable access to vision care and innovation of affordable eye care solutions in emerging markets, as part of the company’s ambition to help eliminate uncorrected poor vision in a generation. In his role, Saugata oversees the development of an ecosystem of sustainable access points to deliver vision care where it did not exist before by designing and scaling innovative inclusive business, product and service solutions.
In 2012, he pioneered the company’s flagship Eye Mitra program which trains youths to become primary vision care micro-entrepreneurs within their communities in rural India. Over the years, the Eye Mitra program was expanded to countries such as Bangladesh, Indonesia and Kenya, forming the world’s largest rural optical network. Today, the Eye Mitra program and the company’s other access creation initiatives have created over 25,000 sustainable access points around the world, providing over 670 million people with vision care services within one day’s travel.
Trained in economics, Saugata holds a Master’s degree from Xavier Institute of Management. He is a graduate of Thunderbird School of Global Management’s advanced management program. He has also attended executive programs in management from ESSEC Business School and leadership from the Center for Creative Leadership.
