Indian American entrepreneur Reshma Kewalramani is the only person of Indian origin figuring in 2025 TIME100, the U.S. magazine’s annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Mumbai-India-born Vertex Pharmaceuticals CEO Kewalramani, 52, features on the list with women like Simone Biles, Scarlett Johansson and Serena Williams and world leaders and U.S. political figures including President Donald Trump, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
Donald Trump is on the list for the 7th time, more than any other person on the list this year. Other repeats include: Elon Musk (6), Mark Zuckerberg (5), Serena Williams (3), Lorne Michaels (3), Simone Biles (3),
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“The 2025 TIME100 list of the world’s most influential people recognizes the leaders shaping the world today and defining its future,” writes TIME Chief Executive Officer Jessica Sibley.
“Reshma Kewalramani’s journey to become the first female CEO of a large, public U.S. biotechnology company after immigrating from India at age 11 embodies what makes America great,” writes Jason Kelly co-founder and CEO Ginkgo Bioworks, in his profile of Kewalramani.
In 2018, her exceptional career in medical research led her to become the chief medical officer of Vertex Pharmaceuticals. Within two years, she was CEO, he notes.
“Reshma sat on my board at Ginkgo Bioworks, and her insights proved invaluable: she knows how to effectively push the limits of science while navigating the drug-approval process, Kelly writes. “She told us that when you are doing something innovative, if it sounds crazy or impossible, that’s OK—it’s only because no one has done it before.”
“Under her leadership, Vertex secured the first-ever FDA approval for a CRISPR-based therapy, which treats sickle cell disease by correcting patients’ own DNA mutations,” he writes. “Our bodies speak the language of DNA. Our best drugs in the future will use DNA to talk directly back to our bodies, leading to many more cures.”
“Reshma is the kind of leader who can deliver that extraordinary future—it only seems crazy because no one’s done it before,” according to Kelly.
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According to Vertex, Kewalramani completed her internship and residency in internal medicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and her fellowship in nephrology at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital combined program.
She received her medical degree from the seven-year medicine program at the Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, and is a Fellow of the American Society of Nephrology. Kewalramani is also an alumna of the Harvard Business School, where she completed the General Management Program.