Indian IT firm Wipro appoints founder's son as new strategy head

Sep 2, 2010, 12:14 GMT

New Delhi - Indian information-technology company Wipro Ltd has appointed founder Azim Premji's son Rishad as the company's chief strategy officer beginning January 1, a company statement said Thursday.

Rishad Premji, 33, would report to the two chief executive officers, who head the company's management team.

The older son of Wipro's founder, Rishad Premji is a graduate of Harvard University's Business School. He joined Wipro, headquartered in Bangalore, in June 2007 as a business manager and currently heads the firm's investor-relations department.

The current chief strategic officer, KR Lakshminarayana, is to move to the Premji Trust as its chief endowment officer.

Wipro chairman Azim Premji, 65, has been increasingly focusing on the activities of the non-profit organization set up by the company.

Azim Premji, who holds about 79-per-cent equity in Wipro, had taken over his father's ailing company, which produced hydrogenated cooking fat, in 1966, diversified and then shifted focus to information technology in 1980.

Wipro, which generated more than 6 billion dollars in revenue in the 2009-2010 financial year, is India's third-largest information-technology firm and has more than 112,000 employees worldwide.

India has a tradition of family-run firms, which have been increasingly hiring professional managers to run their businesses.

One of India's oldest and best-known companies, the Tata Group, announced this year that it was looking beyond the family for a successor to chairman Ratan Tata, who is set to retire in 2012 when he turns 75.