Should India allow UK to decide its visa regime? If not, then why dictate rules for UK visa? I find it surprising that Indian industry and government should get upset over another country's visa regime. Allowing anyone into a country is its own prerogative. The advantages or disadvantages of any such regime is theirs alone. Most people and institutions in India bristle with anger when our visa regime is questioned. India remains pretty racist and tough about its visa regime too. Getting visa for India is perhaps as difficult for foreigners as it is for Indians to get a UK visa. India gives visa on arrival to nationals of only 11 countries. According to the Indian Bureau of Immigration these countries are: Finland, Japan, Luxembourg, New Zealand , Singapore, Cambodia, Vietnam, Philippines, Laos, Myanmar and Indonesia.So, two from Europe and rest from Asia pacific. And absolutely none from 55 countries in Africa. Hints of racism?Those who say that the UK visa move is racist should first examine how India treats its visitors. Indian society and institutions more racist than we care to accept. Recently Punjab police arrested 14 students from Congo on a flimsy excuse after they were racially abused by locals. These are paying students who are enrolled post graudate college in Ludhiana. There are several such examples of racist behaviour by Indians. Read what Christophe Okito, president of the Association of African Students in India, wrote about Indians: "We really get the impression that many of them truly believe that black people are cursed by the gods, destined to be slaves, whereas white people here as seen as intrinsically successful." This exposes Indian hypocisy on charges of racism. India's squeal of pain on visa displays a sense of needless inadequacy. We no longer live in an era where UK was the only country for Indians to travel for work, education or leisure. If UK makes it tough for Indians, then it is UK's loss not ours. Today, Indians have a choice to study, holiday or invest in any country of the world and they spend billions of dollars aboard. Most statistics show that Indians are exploring new regions like never before. Indian students alone spend over $2 billion on education abroad. If UK makes it tough, the students should move to other countries. But this is where the problem lies. India's much celebrated advantage of being comfortable in English is making it complacent and lazy. Indian students and business are slow to embrace European and East Asian languages. At a time when centre of economic gravity is shifting away from English speaking countries, Indians continue to cling to the language. Even though most Indians grow up in a multilingual atmosphere, they are loath to learn foreign languages. Keenness to learn East Asian languages including Mandarin is low in India. Given the importance of Korean investment and brands in India, few students or professionals are enthused by its language. Students looking for education abroad don't take up French, German or Spanish in adequate numbers. Neither do professionals. Learning Spanish opens up the entire continent of South America and much of US too. French offers access to one third of African continent that is francophone. The visa muddle with the UK is a good occasion to rethink priorities about Indian attitude to the world. Industry bodies, academic institutions and government should emphasise the importance of new markets and new languages. Staying in the comfort zone of English speaking countries will not help in the long run. Indians should also introspect on their racist social attitude. Any slight from the west is treated as racism while we continue to be nasty to non-whites. Greater maturity and evolution of thought and lesser hypocrisy will be needed as India grows up in this rapidly changing world. (Pranjal Sharma is a senior business writer. He can be contacted at pranjalx@gmail.com)
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It was a shocker for both the company as well as its shareholders. The day after Apollo Tyres announced it will take over US-based Cooper Tire & Rubber Company for Rs 14,500 crore, Apollo shareholders scurried to sell the stock, shaving off a quarter of the company’s valuation in a day’s trading to Rs 3,457 crore. The company’s shares fell 25.43 per cent to a 52-week low of Rs 67.75 on BSE on Thursday (June 13). The stock, which closed Wednesday at Rs 92, opened at Rs 86 and fell sharply before closing at Rs 68.60.So why did Apollo shareholders panic at the announcement of one of the most audacious attempts at a corporate takeover by an Indian company abroad? The answer lies in some really patchy performance of most global acquisitions by Indian companies.Around 2007, Indian companies had shown unusual aggression — finding new export markets, building greenfield plants and acquiring companies overseas. But the scene turned gloomy with the fall of subprime mortgage market in the US and the chain of crises in Eurozone. But the Kanwar family led Apollo Tyres took the risk of buying a company of double its revenue (Apollo’s Rs 12,800 crore and Cooper’s Rs 24,350 crore) at Rs 14,500 crore. That too, in the matured and saturated US market.Read Also: Apollo Tyres To Buy Cooper Tire for $2.5 BnCooper Tire & Rubber Company is a home grown tyre company focused on North America, from where its $3.1-billion of the consolidated revenue of $4.2 billion came in 2012. Indian companies have strong presence in the region where Cooper operates. Tata group has brands like Tetley, Good Earth, Eight O’Clock Coffee, The Pierre New York and the Campton Place Hotel (in San Francisco) in North America. Essar group operates steel mills like Algoma and Minnesota and the BPO service. The group has 5000 employees there. Wipro is a major IT service provider in the region.In a sense, Apollo is venturing into a proven fertile land for Indian companies. But most Indian companies are struggling. Tata Steel is still struggling with the high net debt of over $10.5 billion because of the acquisition of Corus. AV Birla group’s Hindalco struggled during downturn, writing off $1.5 billion goodwill value of acquired entity Novelis. Bharti, which acquired Zain in Africa for $9 billion, is yet to make a mark in the continent. Apollo’s acquisition would form the world's seventh largest tire company. The major positive factor is that Cooper had a record $397-million operating profit in 2012, which is 9.5 per cent of net sales. The company still dominates the replacement tyre industry, which is highly fragmented in the US. The economic slowdown has led to a slump in the tyre sales but it recovered in 2010 with the stabilization of passer vehicle industry and the overall US economy.In the present scenario, the surging fuel prices are encouraging the consumers to move towards fuel efficient tires. Apollo needs to enquire about Cooper’s innovations in the category before closing the deal. Managing the debt will be another concern. Apollo needs to ensure consistent cash flow from Cooper to repay the debt. For instance, even Tata Motors had struggled with debt at one point because of the acquisition of Jaguar and Land Rover, though the cost was lesser at $2.3 billion."This (acquisition) will result in an increase in the consolidated debt:equity for Apollo from 0.75x to 1.35x and the net debt:EBITDA from 1.7x to 3.8x. The sharp increase in debt we reckon will be an area of concern for investors who were expecting balance sheet deleveraging in the next two years," Credit Suisse analysts said in a report. Goldman Sachs analysts feel that Apollo's net debt to equity will rise even though Cooper will service a significant portion of the additional debt. Kotak Institutional Equities says, since the size of the transaction is very large, compared with the current operations, it could swing either way for Apollo. Ambit Capital says Apollo's acquisition is aggressive and has downgraded the stock to "sell" from "buy."
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On a day when a swanky 40,000 sq ft mall, christened House of Technology aka HOT opened shop at the Nehru Place metro station, Businessworld did a quick round of the hundreds of small shops in the vicinity to find whether they were worried about the competition from modern retail. Especially one that plans to be open 24/7.Surprisingly, most shopkeepers that we spoke to appeared quite sanguine. They confidently said that the overhead costs of a swanky mall wouldn't allow retailers there to match the discounts they themselves could offer.“Their costs are so much more; to turn profits they will never be able to offer discounts like we do. Nehru Place runs on discounts. A person looking to invest upwards of Rs 30,000 in a laptop, if he were to get no discount will go to any mall and buy on MRP. They won’t bother coming to a mall in Nehru Place,” said a shopkeeper.But one factor in favour of the HOT mall possibly, is that it will remain open till about 2 AM , while the old market downs shutter at about 8.00 PM . Developers say they are in the process of getting approval for running the mall 24x7.“A lot of working people would like the convenience of shopping late at night or early morning. This is the demographic we want to cater to,” pointed out Vipul Jain, director, Unique Infoways, developers of HOT.However, the small retailers of Nehru Place continued to talk about their price advantage. Even in terms of the rentals that they have to pay-Rs 1200 per sq ft as opposed to the Rs 1600 per sq ft that the developers of Hot have to shell out.Yet another shopkeeper was of the opinion that the threat will happen only if the owners of the mall are able to procure goods at a cheaper price through tie-ups with parent brands. “If they aren’t able to do that, if these brands sell directly with nominal discounts on MRP, they will not make a dent at all,” he says.For its part, HOT has set some cool targets for itself. It expects about 12,000 footfalls daily and targets a sale of Rs 20 crore per month. The promoters said they will be hosting IT and electronics exhibitions ,new product demonstrations and brand launches at the mall.Already on the day of the launch, buzz was being created by brands like Lenovo, HP, Dell, HCL and others in the laptop and PC space; Samsung, Nokia, Lenovo, and Blackberry for mobile phones, Toshiba, Samsung, Panasonic and LG in the television area. Buyers looking for an option for cameras, microwaves and air conditioning units, also have a spectrum of choices. A food court at the mall offers customers tantalising options of dishes - again solid competition for those weaned on the delicious street fare of the old Nehru Place market. It's early days still - one will have to wait and see if both these IT hubs can co-exist in the same location without cannibalising each other's share.
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Kaushik Thakkar, CEO and Co-founder of Mumbai-based Nevales Networks, is a seasoned business and technology excutive with hands-on experience of setting up businesses in Asia, Europe, Latin America and US. Nevales manages security, connectivity and enables cloud applications for enterprise customers’ branch offices and remote locations on a 'Pay As You Use' model. A global citizen, Thakkar was born in Africa, holds a Swedish passport, is an OCI (Overseas Citizen of India) and is also eligible for US citizenship. Though he has never stayed in India, he still feels very connected to it. The Silicon Valley-based Thakkar spoke to BW Online's Poonam Kumar on how he plans on meeting local challenges and providing solution to local needs.Excerpt:When did you start Nevales Networks?I, Sunija Rishi and Ravi Shankar founded Nevales Networks in early 2010, with the main intent of building a hi-tech company based out of India. Although Indians have founded one-third of the hi-tech companies in the Silicon Valley, not many were founded in India. Nevales is the first company I have set up in India. Secondly, we saw local businesses facing a lot of problems that needed a solution. We thought a company that solved local Indian needs that Indian customers were willing to pay for, would have a very big potential. Our assumptions turned out to be right. With my hi-tech background and experience of taking companies globally, I was asked by the shareholders and investors to take up the CEO position. Initially, I wanted to continue with my role in strategies and partnerships, but then I agreed to take over as CEO on March 1st, with the intent of running the CEO and CTO functions from the Silicon Valley. India still plays a big role with majority of the team being based in India, especially in engineering and post sales/support. But the plan is to reach global markets directly from Silicon Valley with the management as well as product management and marketing being run from the Silicon Valley.What is the trend you have seen emerging in Indian business over the years?My first experience with India was when we started selling products from my previously founded company PortWise in 2002. In 2002, the market for advanced security products was fairly new. Enterprises and banks had some experience, but the typical resellers and customers were still learning. So one thing I see is that Indian business have learnt so much, and built up big knowledge and experience base. Local requirements and challenges obviously are different from the West. On processes and sales, we see the businesses tracking more data, and more connected, especially with deep penetration of mobile phones. Of course Internet connectivity, speed and reliability are completely different compared to 2002-2004. I also feel the self confidence for businesses have gone up, especially after the Tata acquisitions of iconic brands like Jaguar, and even Tetley Tea. But also the huge global success of Infosys, TCS, Wipro etc have made Indians in general more informed about the world.So to summarise, I believe Indian businesses are more connected, more informed and I expect actually over a period of time seeing more successful companies coming out of India. We also feel Indian companies are getting more aware of the security risks in connected businesses, and that the threats from Russian and Chinese hackers are actually a real threat.How much did you invest in setting up Nevales Networks?When we founded Nevales, the founders together with very close Angel Investors, invested approximately $500 K (5,00,000). In the same year, Seedfund — today the largest individual shareholder — invested a couple of million dollars. We liked Seedfund, as they have a very visionary view on investing where they want to take bets on game changers. Their other investments include Carwale, the hugely successful Redbus etc. They believed in our vision, and actually gave us space to build the product for over two years without revenue, which is a model not that common in India.What is your take on investment climate in India?Investment climate is always very cyclical, and investors have a tendency of following each other. Also as India is more integrated with the global economy, it gets affected by global changes. For a long period of time, a lot of investments have gone to India, and compared to Russia and China, many investors believe the returns have taken longer time and not been on the same level. In some sectors like e-commerce, a lot of capital has gone in and some adjustments/consolidations surely are expected. Although I believe that even if some slowdown takes place, the underlying trend is very strong. We have a growing middle class, that is more informed, more travelled with high consumption power (less loans and credit compared to US counterparts), and by continuing to solve structural issues we still have a very big opportunity in India.What are your views on entrepreneurship ecosystem in India?Initially when capital started coming to India, very few had experience in entrepreneurship. In India, it is still to be accepted as an entrepreneur. As both family and others expect you to have a college degree and take a safe government job or job in a large MNC. But by seeing the success stories, and more people entering and nurturing the eco system, the situation is looking up. I think in the second wave we will see really big ideas created and large companies being formed. TiE had a big role in India, and also all the Angel networks/funds that look from an entrepreneurs perspective are truly nurturing the eco system from the lowest grass roots levels. I believe this is the only way to create a sustainable model and foundation.I also believe young women in India are a big untapped resource. They are normally very well educated, and from childhood they are used to doing multiple things (studying, helping with family etc) and they have the motivation also to show what women can do. So I believe we will see many more very successful women entrepreneurs out of India.Now e-commerce portals are a rage. What are the risks in this business as you are also on the board of directors of Mara Online.The Indian middle class is growing and with increasing buying power, it’s just a matter of time when more of the purchasing will go online, especially when we have infrastructure challenges, and shopping is left mostly to women. With this opportunity, and with huge success in western countries, as well as Russia, China and Korea, it’s just a matter of time before India is in the same position. But Amazon was not built overnight. With more capital available, every company did their level best to attract customers, even with unsustainable business models. We see consolidations/adjustments currently taking place in India.Mara Online is targeting the problem differently, where our target market is Sub Saharan Africa, which today is very under-served market. We are also targeting a very young population that is going to be the future consumers. With no technology legacy, our plan is to build a large Mobile Internet Company targeting specifically youth in Sub Saharan Africa, but where we will strategically build infrastructure for payments and communications, to enable for the next e-bay, Amazon and future travel, jobs and e-commerce companies.What are your future plans?As an entrepreneur you always have a vision, but focus on the present so that you can achieve your vision. I am very pleased that I have got the opportunity to work in India, invest and start companies from India and help the Indian eco-system for entrepreneurs thrive and gain global recognition. This has been important for me as my family has been Africa-based for 3-4 generations. But after Idi Amin (the third President of Uganda), we ended up in Sweden as stateless refugees. Today I am privileged to be a Swedish citizen, OCI in India and am also eligible for US citizenship. So fortunes change very quickly. Though I have never stayed in India, I feel very connected to India.Besides short and medium term plan, with my projects and investments, especially the bigger bets Mara Online and Nevales, we are still looking at India as a big play. On the personal front, one goes through different stages in life, and I have come to a stage where I don't feel I need to prove myself, and am looking for contributing where things matter. I don't believe charity is the only route but there are other routes, where you can help people to start businesses and from there to help society create jobs and wealth.poonam(dot)kumar(at)abp(dot)inpoonam(dot)bw(at)gmail(dot)com
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As IT extends itself beyond the exclusive domain of large multinational enterprises into small and medium size businesses, there is a dynamic shift in the way technology is being consumed and therefore the way it is being purchased. Becoming more of a commodity and a standard across enterprises, technology companies will find it harder to differentiate their products and services to compete in an increasingly price sensitive market. While the broad expectations that enterprises have from their IT infrastructure and processes will remain unchanged, the dependence on IT to deliver faster time to market, more accurate customer insights and drive competitive advantage and business growth will increase. Tech marketers can watch out for these trends to ensure that they stay relevant to their customer's business needs in the coming future.Focus on customer benefit than product features: In this highly commoditised market where competition is intense and one product and service not too different from the other, it is difficult not to fall into the trap of price competition, and we all know that no company can survive if it competes on price alone. In 2013, IT companies will focus on building new and innovative products and services that better address the needs of their customers. One of the top trends by IDC for 2013 is datacentre transformation led by cloud; Converged Systems will account for over one third of enterprise cloud deployments by 2016. Customers are changing their infrastructure to virtualized environments and shifting to the Cloud, making security and integration the key challengesof the transition. IT companies will need to innovate and raise the bar for competitors, forcing the market to invest in new customer-centric products and solutions to address these challenges. Converged Infrastructure helps IT organizations respond to business demands more rapidly, improve data centre efficiency and strengthen IT service quality.Brands should listen and engage through social media: Brands are likely to invest in more sophisticated media monitoring systems and will integrate their social media monitoring with customer relationship management processes. In 2013, companies will step up from being mere listeners to becoming actively involved and engaged in what their customers and potential customers are saying about them on the internet. Social media platforms should be used to engage customers; develop interest and participation around the company's products and services. Another way to engage with customers is through business platforms like Linkedin. Being engaged with both retail and enterprise customers via these social media platforms will integrate an organisation's service and customer relationship management with these listening tools.Evidence based marketing: It is not enough anymore to drive campaigns with fancy advertising and eye-catching slogans. Customers are bound to make their decisions based on solid proof instead of taking things at face value. In such a case, customer testimonials become a very important factor to boost any brand. Marketers will have to depend more on customer opinion to drive market perception and goodwill. Marketing will go local: Channel partnerships will increase in significance as growing markets continue to prosper and develop. How much IT companies succeed in gaining a share of these markets will depend on how effective their channel partnership program is. A good channel partner program will have to be backed by training initiatives and incentives to nurture and nourish partner relationships and stay top of mind at all times. In future marketers will, as always focus on growing their customer base and market share, it will become imperative that they keep their eyes glued to the credibility and reputation indexes of their brands. Customers today have the power through, social media, to influence the way brands are perceived in the market place, therefore keeping them engaged at all times will become a priority that can no longer be ignored. Ravi Bharadwaj, Executive Director, Marketing for Dell
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Returning to India with an emphasis on safety, speed and youth, Volvo has been wooing young executives for picking up their sedans — the S80 2.4-litre twin turbo diesel with 182 bhp of power and the S60 T6 2.9-litre petrol with its 325 bhp muscle. The latter is a beast with a heart, while the former is an older man's car. Brand Volvo has been known as a car for the executive with a family who paid for extreme safety. At this juncture, the company is trying to blend safety features with its new DNA of yuppie executive sportiness. The message from the Volvo dealers is that safety comes above all even when driving very fast and you can experience that in a Volvo. That may not be cool enough for young drivers who take safety as a given. Now, if you are a mature executive and scared to press the pedal, Volvo is the car for you. It is Volvo's plethora of safety features that remind you that you have to get back home rather than show off to the young people out there. In India, Volvo buses are known as luxurious people carriers and are all too common after a decade. So will the cars be known in the same vein? They are luxurious no doubt. Still only time will tell what the brand wants to communicate in India. Interiors of S60The brand is reinvesting in 4-cylinder turbo-charged engines for these cars and the sedans in their new avatars will be out in India by next year. Remember the current platforms are at least 3-5 years old. But then, why buy these cars at all? With eight airbags and the stocky car structure, you are sure not to be hurt. The T6 reaches 0-100 kilometres in 6.2 secs and D5 cracks it in a little over 8 secs. One can do a bend at 210 kilometres per hour and not be shaken if you have the driving expertise. Personally, Businessworld got lucky and the car did not fish-tail. This performance is standard with all executive sedans of this era, especially with these all-wheel-drive vehicles. The Volvos at that cost, Rs 36 lakh for a S60 T6 and Rs 47 lakh for the D5 S80, will make people want to think twice before they sign on a BMW and Audi's entry luxury cars. It is here that they do not disappoint. This is also where one needs to think, is your mind on safety, mobile and machine interface, style or acceleration? In styling and mobility tehnology, the Audis and the BMWs are way ahead at the moment. Acceleration at that level makes every car superior and these two sedans are up there with the best in their class of cars. IInteriors of S80t is again the safety features that make Volvo superior. The city safety braking system allows you to literally dream when driving at 40-50 kilometres per hour, because it stops automatically before the car crashes on to the pedestrian. Then there is a laser-tracking system that warns of you of collisions when speeding. These features you can depend on and it is much more than just a leap of faith. Now do all these safety features make you feel old? They shouldn't because the IIHS, an industry watchdog that rates cars on highway and city safety, rates Volvos as the safest cars to drive. The ground clearance too is 151mm for the S80 and 130mm for the S60. The ground clearance makes handling of the S60 a bit of a bother here in India, while the S80 compares well to the Audi A6 and is easier to handle in the city. Volvo may not be as cool as a Audi or the BMW but is certainly trying to shun the safety evangelist tag. The T6 S60 petrol and the S80 D5 twin turbo diesel certainly do a good job of it even when the larger brand is going through a balancing act. S80 2.4-litre twin turbo diesel with 182 bhp of powervishal(dot)krishna(at)abp(dot)invishalskrishna(at)gmail(dot)comtwitter(at)vishalskrishna
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Foreign banks in India face a big question mark over their foreign exchange (forex) operations as they near the 30 September 2013 deadline set by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) which makes it made mandatory for central counter-parties (CCP) in non-European Union (EU) jurisdictions to be recognised by it. The issue has now come to a boil given the initial reluctance shown by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the country’s CCP –- the Clearing Corporation of India Ltd (CCIL) -– to fall in line with ESMA’s (a third party) wishes. ISDA officials met with RBI and CCIL officials on 11 and 12 March, but those in the know of these meetings, nothing conclusive was arrived at. Foreign banks have also approached the RBI to seek an early resolution, but senior officials at these banks admitted the matter has taken diplomatic overtones. “Such unilateral norms across financial jurisdictions is hard to comply with in an inter-connected financial world," said a foreign bank official on the condition of anonymity. If the new norms were to kick in from 1 October, foreign banks cannot use the CCIL platform to settle trades. As on date, the CCIL platform is used only for debt trades, but effective from 1st January 2014, the RBI wants forward trades in the forex mart to be also on it. When contacted by BW, the RBI spokesperson “declined comment” on the issue. It Could Singe AmbitionsThe ESMA stand can affect the ambitions of several large foreign banks like Standard Chartered Bank (StanChart), HSBC and Citi which see India as a key growth market. Numbers are hard to come by given these banks do not do their segmented reporting public in India, but concede in private the corporate banking piece contributes significantly to their revenues even as they strive to grow their retail business in a niche manner. It is a fact bought in the latest RBI Report on Trend and Progress of Banking in India (2011-12). It notes “in recent years, generally profitability of foreign banks was higher than other bank groups. Some past studies on profitability concluded that higher profitability of foreign banks could be attributed to their access to low cost CASA (current and savings accounts) deposits, diversification of income as well as higher “other income”. “Other income” can be hugely affected if ESMA has its way. It was the main reason why during 2011-12, foreign banks accounted for close to 12 per cent of the total net profit of all banks; as against this, their share in total assets of Indian banking sector stood at 7 per cent, says RBI. Foreign banks are yet to declare their results for 2012-13. As at end-March 2012, there were 41 foreign banks operating in India with 323 branches. Another 46 foreign banks had their representative offices in India. Among foreign banks, Standard Chartered had the maximum spread of bank branches in India (96 branches) followed by HSBC (50 branches), Citi Bank N.A. (42 branches) and Royal Bank of Scotland N.V. (31 branches). United We Stand...The silver lining is ESMA’s diktat has been resisted by key European banks. The chief operating officers and treasury head six major European financial entities -- Deustche Bank, BNP Paribas, BNP Asia Bank, StanChart, Societe Generale and Barclays –- have written to Mitchell Barnier, the European Commisioner for Internal market and Services in the European Commission on the fallout of ESMA’s rigid stand. “It would have serious implications for the current, long established Asian operations of EU banks at a time when the EU is looking to the East for growth opportunities, and Asian operations are looking for the West for investments”, said six senior officials at these banks the co-signed letter. Their names are Peter Connor, managing director-Deutsche Bank (Asia Pacific); Patrick Colle, general manager-BNP Paribas; Robert W. Hawley head of fixed income-BNP Asia Bank; Brendan Mackinney, regional chief operating officer at StanChart (Europe); and Andrew Jones, chief operating officer at Barclays (Asia Pacific). The US Securities Exchange Commission and Japan Financial Services Agency too have voiced reservations on ESMA’s worldview. businessworldonline (at) gmail (dot) com
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India’s third largest software services exporter Infosys Ltd has lost its global sales head Basab Pradhan, who tweeted about his departure from the company saying that he was returning to the startup world. Pradhan has been a veteran of the company having joined it in 1994 and this is his second stint with Infosys. He had quit Infosys in 2005 along with a few colleagues to start Gridstone Research as its CEO. In 2009, he rejoined the company.Infosys has been struggling to bag large orders in the recent past compared to some of its peers like TCS, Cognizant and HCL Technologies. Recently N.R. Narayana Murthy returned to the company as its Executive Chairman. Murthy had said that the company would take all necessary steps to get back to its growth path. Pradhan’s departure is seen as an indication of the attempt by Murthy to revamp the company’s sales team. Pradhan was a member of the highest decision making body of the company, the executive council. His departure just three days before the company announces its first quarter numbers of the current fiscal may indicate that Infosys might still be struggling to grow. Read Also: Grievances Galore At Infosys AGMRead Also: The Return Of Mr Murthy venkatesha(dot)babu(at)abp(dot)invenkatesha(at)gmail(dot)comTwitter: (at)venkateshababu
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