He is not just the CEO of Tech Mahindra but the man who turned around the company to become one of the country’s top five IT firms. CP, as he is popularly known, joined in November 2004, when the company was known as Mahindra British Telecom. Over the years, he has become a leader who is revered as he steered the company to newer heights in the most uncertain times.
After all, he played a pivotal role in the company’s transformational journey during the acquisition of Satyam Computer Services in 2009. When Satyam founder B.Ramalinga Raju confessed to inflating his company’s accounts by over $1 billion, it seemed the only way Satyam could go was downhill. But, Anand Mahindra acquired it that very year and roped in Gurnani as the CEO who was then heading international operations at Tech Mahindra.
The rest is history. Today, the merged entity, known as Tech Mahindra, is widely known and respected in the industry. The company has been on a steady growth trajectory since then. To give an indication of the most recent performance, the company beat analyst expectations for the third quarter ended December 2016, posting a 14 per cent year-on-year jump in consolidated net profit to Rs 856 crore. Its revenue in dollar terms was up 10 per cent year-on-year and 4.1 per cent sequentially at $1,116.1 million.
“Our differentiated offerings focused on the five pillars of our DAVID (digitalisation, automation, verticalisation, innovation, and disruption) strategy, position us as a strong partner of choice for global businesses,” Gurnani said about the Q3 earnings.
In keeping with the pace of change and filling gaps in its portfolio, Tech Mahindra’s growth has largely come from a string of strategic acquisitions made to consistently strengthen its competencies. For instance, the acquisition of Lightbridge Communications Corporation gave Tech Mahindra an opportunity to offer full range of network services and integrated infrastructure solutions to communication service providers as well as to the ecosystem of partners catering to the communication sector.
Consulting and services company Sofgen, on the other hand, gave the IT giant an opportunity to enhance expertise and to implement modernised core banking and transformation services capabilities. In 2014, Tech Mahindra acquired 75 per cent in FixStream Networks to strengthen its big data and analytics portfolio. The acquisition of a majority stake in Italian automotive design and engineering services firm Pininfarina has enhanced the engineering design and services footprint (currently contributing 7 per cent to revenues) of Tech Mahindra.
In a career spanning 35 years, Gurnani has held several leading positions with HCL Hewlett Packard, Perot Systems (India), and HCL Corporation. An outstanding people’s manager, he tends to focus on people’s strengths to bring out the best in them. ‘Work hard and play hard’ is his motto and he applies it to all aspects of his life with complete passion. Today, Gurnani is a rolemodel for more than 1,00,000 people that Tech Mahindra employs globally across various geographies.
BW Reporters
Ayushman is an award-winning business and tech journalist based in Bangalore, with diverse experience in journalism across newspaper, magazine and news wire. He is the recipient of the 15th annual Polestar Award in Jury's category for excellence in journalism in 2013. He is also an NSE-certified capital market professional (NCCMP) and driven by his interest, he has also attended hands-on workshops on cloud computing to stay on top of technology journalism
