Bengaluru: Wipro Ltd has split its India and Middle East business, which accounts for 10% of its revenue, into two separate divisions under new heads and merged one of the divisions focussed on automation platforms with the larger technology unit, as chief executive Abidali Neemuchwala looks to put the company back on the growth path.
President of the India and Middle East region, Soumitro Ghosh, has sought retirement and starting April next year, Sreenath A.V. will lead the India business while Pandurang Desai will head the Middle East region, a company spokesman said.
Wipro’s business in India and the Middle East geographies has declined since the beginning of the current financial year.
Further, Wipro will merge the two-and-half-year old division, Business Outcome Services (BOS), with its technology division, overseen by K.R. Sanjiv, company’s chief technology officer (CTO). BOS, set up as an independent division in 2014 by then chief executive officer T.K. Kurien, was mandated to build and roll out automation platforms across the company. BOS head and senior vice-president Anurag Srivastava has decided to leave the company.
Wipro decided to decentralize decision making as it is in the midst of its biggest push to embrace automation and is asking managers to identify processes that would not require engineers in each of the over 20,000 projects currently underway.
“After a long and rewarding career of 28 years with Wipro, Soumitro Ghosh, president, India and Middle East Markets, has expressed his desire to retire on 31 March 2017,” a company spokesman said. “We thank him for his tremendous contributions to Wipro and wish him the very best. Effective 1 April 2017, the India and Middle East unit will be reorganized into two separate businesses.”
Desai, the new Middle East head, will report to Anand Padmanabhan, president and head of the oil and gas division, while India business head Sreenath will report to Neemuchwala.
“Separately, Wipro will consolidate all its automation assets and capabilities under the Holmes brand and significantly increase its investment in Hyper-automation through the creation of a new hyper-automation group,” the Wipro spokesman said.
Wipro launched its artificial intelligence (AI) platform Holmes 18 months ago.
Hyper-automation is one of the central pillars of Neemuchwala’s vision of making Wipro a $15 billion firm by 2020 with an operating margin of 23%, Mint reported on 2 November. Wipro ended the year to March with $7.35 billion in revenue and 20.5% profitability.
Wipro’s CTO Sanjiv, will lead the new hyper-automation unit in addition to his present responsibilities and continue to report to G.K. Prasanna, president, marketing, innovations and technology.
Both Ghosh and Srivastava are also part of the 19-member executive committee set up last year to roll out Wipro’s roadmap including technology needs.
The changes come after Wipro appointed B.M. Bhanumurthy as chief operating officer and promoted some executives to the rank of president.
The company currently has eight presidents
[Source:-Livemint]
