Sabrina Singh joins the White House Indian-American diaspora

Indian-American Sabrina Singh has been appointed as the White House Deputy Press Secretary in the forthcoming Joe Biden administration. She joins a strong line-up of 15 representation of the Indian-American community in the newly elected Joe Biden Kamala Harris transition. Sabrina was the Press Secretary to Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, during the Biden Harris campaign. Prior to her Harris campaign run, Sabrina was a senior spokesperson for Mike Bloomberg’s presidential campaign as well as for the National Press Secretary, Cory Booker. She has also worked at SKDK nickerbocker, as Communications Director for Rep. Jan Schakowsky and at various Democratic committees. Sabrina’s political career extends to her past roles as former deputy communications director for the Democratic National Committee, spokesperson for American Bridge’s Trump War Room and Regional Communications Director on Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. A press release by President-elect Joe Biden said, “Building our nation back better requires having the best and the brightest in our administration.” The other new Indian American representation includes Neera Tanden, Director of the Office of Management and Budget; Dr Vivek Murthy, Surgeon General; Vanita Gupta, Associate Attorney General; Ali Zaidi, Deputy National Climate Advisor; Gautam Raghavan, Deputy Director of the Office of Presidential Personnel; Bharat Ramamurti, Deputy Director for the National Economic Council for Financial Reform and Consumer Protection; Vinay Reddy, Director of Speechwriting; Rohini Kosoglu, Domestic Policy Advisor to the Vice President; Shanthi Kalathil, Coordinator for Democracy and Human Rights; Mala Adiga, Policy Director to Dr Jill Biden; Tarun Chhabra, Senior Director for Technology and National Security; Sumona Guha, Senior Director for South Asia; Aisha Shah, Partnerships Manager, Office of Digital Strategy and Vedant Patel, Assistant Press Secretary.

Rajeev Kumar Mehta

Hexaware Tech on boards ex-Cognizant President

Rajeev Kumar Mehta, a current board member at Hexaware Technologies has been elevated as non-executive chairman. Mehta, as former President of Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp, was instrumental in converting Cognizant from being a small regional IT firm to more than $16 billion in revenue. During his tenure in the company, he held a variety of roles including Group CEO IT Services and Group CEO Industries and Markets. In another move, Hexaware founder Atul Nishar will step down from his current role as Chairman and will continue with the company as Chairman Emeritus.

Dharmendra Kumar (DK) Sinha

Cognizant veteran D K Sinha steps down, company rejigs globally

Cognizant veteran and President of North America, Dharmendra Kumar (DK) Sinha, will be retiring from the company in July. Sinha makes way for Gregory Hyttenrauch, former president of Cognizant Digital Systems & Technology, who will replace Sinha. Sinha, a stalwart with the company has managed about 75% of Cognizant’s business and will be hanging his boots after a long inning of 24 years. In 2019, he was elevated to lead the company’s North American strategy, industry verticals, sales, delivery as well as mergers and acquisitions. Prior to that, Sinha was the President of global client services. The company has lately undergone leadership changes and reorganisation, which has also impacted its operating model, making it easier for its clients to do business with the firm. In other moves, the company is combining two of its service lines digital business (DB) and digital systems and technology (DS&T), into a new service line called digital business and technology (DB&T) to be led globally by Malcolm Frank. Frank, a 15 year veteran with the firm, was former President of Cognizant Digital Business. In other moves, sigital operations will now be called digital business operations and will continue to be led by its President, Ganesh Ayyar.

Aditya Puri

Pharma giant ropes in Aditya Puri to steer growth

Global pharmaceutical major, Strides Group has roped in Aditya Puri, former Managing Director of HDFC Bank to join as an advisor and also to serve as a director of its associate company Stelis Biopharma. Strides is at a juncture as it transitions from its incubation phase to a consolidation and growth phase, aiming to bring world class treatments at affordable costs to patients in both emerging and developed markets. Puri said the Stride Group’s established parentage, global success and head start in terms of basic infrastructure gives him the opportunity to be involved in and guide Stelis and other Group endeavours. Puri had relinquished his long innings of 25 years at HDFC when he retired in October 2020, after a highly successful career, which has made the bank the largest among private sector lenders. In November 2020, Puri was also roped in by US based global investment firm Carlyle Group as a senior advisor.

Vani Manja

Boehringer Ingelheim appoints Vani Manja as MD, India

Vani Manja takes charge as Country Managing Director for Boehringer Ingelheim’s India operations and will also be responsible for its businesses in India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Manja will also join the Boehringer Board. As former Global Head of Boehringer Ingelheim’s Go To Market and Business Steering organisation, Manja was based at the company’s headquarters in Germany. Her association dates back to 2011 when she joined Boehringer in the US, working across Strategy & Operations, Marketing and Sales leadership roles before moving to Ingelheim in 2016 as Regional Business Manager for Japan. Her global experience in healthcare spans nearly two decades across McKinsey & Company, Becton Dickinson and Boehringer Ingelheim. Her roles have been characterised by strong global mobility and cross functional leadership assignments across management consulting and healthcare. She is an alumnus of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and Chemistry grad from Delhi University.

Mukesh Ambani slips positions in Asian and World Billionaire List

Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL) has slipped to 13th rank on the world’s richest billionaires list and has recently been dethroned by Chinese billionaire Zhong Shanshan, who has now become Asia’s wealthiest person. According to the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index, Ambani’s current net worth is $73.4 billion (nearly INR 5.36 lakh crore), down from his previous wealth estimates of nearly $90 billion (INR 6.62 lakh crore). He had grabbed 4th position in August 2020 on the Bloomberg rich list, and in December 2020 he was one of the top 10 richest billionaires list at 11th position with a net worth at $76.5 billion (INR 5.63 lakh crore). Over the last three months, RIL shares witnessed a decline at nearly 18% from a 52 week high following the company’s announcement to buy retail and wholesale assets of Kishore Biyani’s Future Group. RIL shares faced a downward turn after U.S. e-commerce giant Amazon challenged its deal with Future Group. According to Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index, Chinese billionaire Zhong Shanshan is now the sixth richest person in the world with a fortune of $91.7 billion. Globally, tech entrepreneur, Elon Musk has taken over Jeff Bezos, to become the world’s richest person with a net worth of $209 billion as against Jeff Bezos’s $186 billion. The other top five billionaires with their respective net worth are Bill Gates with $134 billion, Bernard Arnault with $117 billion and Mark Zukerberg with $101 billion.

Indian-American Legal Eagle suspends Trump’s Twitter account

Vijaya Gadde, Head of Legal, Policy and Trust and Safety issues at Twitter was instrumental in permanently suspending U.S. President Donald Trump’s Twitter account. India born Gadde, is Twitter’s top lawyer and spearheaded the exceptional move by the microblogging site when the outgoing U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted that he would not attend the inauguration of his successor, Joe Biden, scheduled January 20, 2021. An alumnus of the Cornell University and New York University Law School, Gadde joined Twitter in 2011, having spent almost a decade at a Bay Area based law firm working with tech startups and in 2014, she was named by Fortune magazine as the only woman in Twitter’s executive team. As a corporate lawyer, Gadde operates in the background assembling policies, but her influence has helped shape up Twitter in the past decade. Ironically, she was in the Oval Office when Twitter co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey met U.S. President Donald Trump last year and also accompanied him during his meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2018. She is also a co-founder of Angels, an investment collective that backs startups and ensures women receive equal compensation at successful companies. Gadde moved to the U.S. as a child and grew up in Texas. She completed her high school in New Jersey when the family moved to the east coast. Her father worked as a chemical engineer on oil refineries in the Gulf of Mexico.

Ogilvy refreshes top deck appointments

Advertising agency Ogilvy has announced new members as it builds its global leadership team. While Ogilvy appointed Jag Dhanji as Global Chief People Officer, Stacey Ryan Cornelius is the Global Chief Financial Officer. Stacey succeeds Steve Goldstein, who is retiring from the business and will stay on for a transition period through early 2021. Stacey and Jag will both report to Andy Main as well as WPP Chief Financial Officer, John Rogers and WPP Chief People Officer, Jacqui Canney respectively. Stacy most recently served as Global Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer of Geometry Global, WPP’s end to end Creative Commerce Agency, where she was a driving force behind the agency’s transformation. Jag takes over for Brian Fetherstonhaugh, Worldwide Chief Talent Officer with the Ogilvy Group. Stacey originally joined Ogilvy in 1999 and has held various regional and global leadership roles, including serving as the company’s Worldwide Controller until 2018. Jag Dhanji joined Ogilvy in October 2017 as Chief Talent Officer for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Dhanji is a seasoned leader with a sound commercial experience working across several international companies and industries including Diageo, Vodafone and Costa. She has worked with diverse teams including the Global Marketing and Innovation team at Diageo, the India leadership team at Vodafone, as well as the International team at Costa.

Wipro and Infosys COOs scheduled to retire

Stalwart Chief Operating Officers (COO) at Infosys, UB Pravin Rao and Wipro’s Bhanumurthy B M are both slated to retire in 2021. While Bhanumurthy will step down in the June quarter, Rao will do so in December. Bhanumurthy has had over 29 years’ run with Wipro. He kick started his career in the retail and CPG vertical. An alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad, he set up the RCTG (retail, CPG, transportation and government) unit for Wipro and brought in key clients like Nike and Best Buy. Wipro’s recent organisational overhaul under CEO Thierry Delaporte has not spelt out a COO position once Bhanumurthy relinquishes his role. Infosys’ Rao, an electrical engineer from Bangalore University has had a long 35 year association with the firm and began his stint with the company in 1986 on a salary of INR 1,500. A friendly chat with his neighbour Bala Kuthiyar, an employee at Infosys then, inspired Rao to join the company. His team set up a landmark offshore delivery centre for GE which was then the biggest IT outsourcer worldwide. While he had won a big contract from Reebok France to set up their information management system, Rao’s career defining moment was spelt as the unit head of retail, CPG and logistics (RCL), the first industry vertical to be formed in Infosys in 2002. Rao subsequently won contracts from Tesco, Walmart, Nordstrom and GAP, each of which grew in size and opportunity.

Karan Bajwa

Google Cloud promotes ex-MS and IBM veteran

Google Cloud has elevated Karan Bajwa as its new leader for the Asia Pacific (APAC) region. He currently leads Google Cloud in India. In his new role, he will lead all regional revenue and manage market operations for Google Cloud, including Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Google Workspace. Karan Bajwa succeeds Rick Harshman who will relinquish his role and leave the organisation for newer pastures while Gurgaon based Bajwa will relocate to Singapore in due course. He will continue to lead as the interim leader for Google Cloud in India until a new senior leader for the business is appointed. He will report to Rob Enslin, President of sales, Google Cloud. Bajwa, an ex-Microsoft and IBM veteran was appointed as the head of Google Cloud in India in March 2020. Google Cloud has witnessed a strong growth trajectory within the Asia Pacific and counts ANZ Bank, Lendlease, Optus, ShareChat, Tech Mahindra, L&T Finance, Wipro, Samsung Electronics, Foxconn, Kia Motors, Gojek, Tokopedia, and XL Axiata among its customers. The company also continues to invest in technical infrastructure in the region having launched its GCP regions in Jakarta and Seoul last year, with planned expansion to Delhi and Melbourne in 2021.

Sunit Sinha

KPMG India appoints Sunit Sinha

KPMG in India has appointed Sunit Sinha as Partner and Head of People, Performance and Culture and will be based out of Gurugram. Sinha’s portfolio comprises of talent management and strategy, driving the people culture and professional development to further operations and growth. He will be responsible for KPMG India’s human resources function. With over 23 years of experience, Sinha has reflected his dominant traits across organisation strategy and transformation, human capital, strategy and leadership development, organisation design, post merger integration, culture transformation and HR transformation in a digital world. Sinha’s long-haul career is marked with several high-level leadership positions. His most recent stint was as Managing Director with Accenture Strategy in Talent and Organisation practice, wherein he established large transformation engagements across the Asia Pacific and the Middle East. Sinha has built global consulting capabilities across China, Indonesia and Latin America. He has also had previous stints with Arthur Andersen and Mercer in the human capital space, M&A integration and talent consulting.

Partha Ghosh

Partha Ghosh to spearhead CSR at Samsung India

Samsung India has appointed Partha Ghosh as the CSR Head, which is in addition to his current role as Vice President & Corporate Communications Head at Samsung Electronics. This dual role is expected to synergise, promote and protect the brand’s corporate reputation. Samsung India, the $10 billion Indian arm of the Samsung conglomerate has a large CSR portfolio in India that focusses on education, skilling and healthcare and other community initiatives in and around its manufacturing facilities and offices. Ghosh is expected to be at the forefront of strategising and planning the CSR initiatives for the organisation. Prior to his current stint with Samsung, Ghosh, a former journalist and a British Chevening scholar, was an Editor at BCCL’s Economic Times and led Sunday ET. He was also Resident Editor for Gujarat, and launched the ET’s language editions. His journalistic stint progressed across various news publications including Business Standard, The Hindu Business Line, the Telegraph and the India Today Group specialising in the companies and government policies domain.