Vodafone and Idea Cellular announced the leadership team for the combined telecom business in India.
The new management team will takeover the leadership position after completing the merger between Idea Cellular and Vodafone making the largest telecom operator in India — ahead of existing leader Bharti Airtel and the new operator Reliance Jio.
Idea Cellular CEO Himanshu Kapania and Vodafone India CEO Sunil Sood will not be part of the merged entity in India.
The existing leadership teams of Idea Cellular and Vodafone will continue to manage their separate businesses and be accountable for each company’s operational performance until the merger becomes effective.
New team
# Chairman: Kumar Mangalam Birla
# CEO: Balesh Sharma
# CFO: Akshaya Moondra
# COO: Ambrish Jain
# Enterprise Business: Nick Gliddon
# Integration planning, governance and execution: Manish Dawar
# Marketing and brand strategy for consumer business: Sashi Shankar
# Networks and technology strategy: Vishant Vora
# IT operations: Prakash Paranjape
# HR: Suvamoy Roy Choudhury
# Digital transformation: Kavita Nair
# Strategy: Navanit Narayan
# Corporate and External Affairs: P Balaji
# Legal function: Kumar Das
# Procurement Function: Rajesh Srivastava
Akshaya Moondra, Ambrish Jain, Nick Gliddon, Manish Dawar, Sashi Shankar, Vishant Vora, Prakash Paranjape, Suvamoy Roy Choudhury, Kavita Nair, Navanit Narayan, P Balaji, Kumar Das and Rajesh Srivastava will report to CEO Balesh Sharma.
The present structure indicates that the Vodafone-Idea combined entity did not look for external resources when they announced a new CEO and other team members to take on Airtel and Reliance Jio.
Their present positions
Balesh Sharma is currently the chief operating officer of Vodafone India.
Akshaya Moondra is currently the chief financial officer at Idea Cellular.
Ambrish Jain is currently the deputy managing director at Idea Cellular.
Nick Gliddon is currently director of Vodafone Business Services at Vodafone India.
Manish Dawar is currently CFO of Vodafone India.
Sashi Shankar is currently the chief marketing officer at Idea Cellular.
Vishant Vora is currently the chief technology officer at Vodafone India.
Prakash Paranjape is currently the chief information officer at Idea.
Suvamoy Roy Choudhury leads Vodafone India’s Human Resources.
Kavita Nair is currently the associate director, Commercial Operations, at Vodafone India. Navanit Narayan is currently the chief service delivery officer at Idea.
P Balaji is currently Vodafone India’s head of Regulatory, External Affairs and CSR.
Kumar Das is currently Vodafone India’s General Counsel.
Rajesh Srivastava is currently chief commercial officer at Idea Cellular.
Anil Tandon, head of Technology and Rajat Mukherjee, head of Corporate Affairs of Idea will be advisers to the merged business in their respective areas of expertise, working closely with Vishant Vora and P Balaji, respectively.
Sunil Sood will join the Vodafone Group AMAP Leadership Team and also help governance through Board memberships. The Aditya Birla Group aims to nominate Himanshu Kapania as non-executive Board member of the merged entity.
