Movements

APPOINTED

Mahmood Ahmed, deputy director general of the licensing finance assessment, Department of Telecom, has been appointed as director on the board of Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited.

ZTE has appointed Yan Xiao as CEO of its Indian operations. He replaces Peng Aiguang, who has now moved back to China. In 2019, Yan took up the role of ZTE India deputy CEO. Before this, he was CEO of ZTE’s operations in Myanmar.

Vinita Bali has been appointed to Cognizant’s Board as a new independent director. Francisco D’Souza, vice chairman, left the Board effective March 31, 2020.

Nokia has eliminated the role of group chief information officer, last held by Ursula Soritsch-Renier. Her responsibilities have been assumed by Bhaskar Gorti, the president of the company’s Nokia Software unit and the group’s chief digital officer.

Vikas Agnihotri, interim head of Google India, has joined SoftBank as its first working accomplice in India.

Facebook has appointed Avinash Pant as marketing director for its India operations. An alumnus of the IIM, Ahmedabad, Pant has earlier worked with Nike, Coca-Cola, The Walt Disney Company, and most recently, Red Bull.

Sharad Mehrotra, CEO, Telenor Myanmar, has been appointed as the CEO of dtac, Telenor Group’s mobile operator in Thailand. He replaces Alexandra Reich, who is seeking new leadership opportunities.

Broadband India Forum has appointed Rajat Mukarji as the director general of the institution. Prior to this Rajat has served in key positions in a number of organizations including Raymonds, Birla AT&T, ZTE India, and most prominently as the chief corporate affairs officer of Idea Cellular for 16 years.

Samsung Electronics has named president Roh Tae-moon as its new mobile chief as part of a management shakeup.

Cisco has appointed Dr Lisa T. Su, president and CEO, AMD to its board of directors. Dr. Su joined AMD in 2012 and has held the position of president and CEO since October 2014. The company has also appointed Reem Asaad as the vice president of its Middle East and Africa region. Before joining Cisco, Asaad served as CEO of Raya Contact Center.

Gordon Mackintosh has been appointed as vice president of worldwide channel and virtual sales, Juniper Networks. Most recently, he was vice president, worldwide channels at Extreme Networks, before ending his 4-year tenure at the end of 2019. Prior to that he worked at Cisco for 8 years.

Sunrise has appointed Uwe Schiller, senior vice president finance and investor relations, as the new CFO. Schiller succeeds Andre Krause, who became CEO on January 3 following the departure of Olaf Swantee.

ELECTED

The IBM board of directors has elected Arvind Krishna as CEO of the company and a member of the board. Krishna is currently IBM senior vice president for cloud and cognitive software. Krishna replaces longtime CEO Virginia Rometty. James Whitehurst, IBM senior vice president and CEO of Red Hat, was also elected by the Board as IBM President.

Sanjay Nayak, MD and CEO, Tejas Networks Ltd has been appointed as chairman, FICCI’s Sectoral Committee on Science, Technology & Innovation for the year 2020.

RESIGNED

Sameer Batra, chief executive officer for broadband services, Bharti Airtel has quit his position to join hands with e-commerce giant Amazon as director for mobile business development. Sameer Batra has served Airtel for 14 years, in multiple roles during his tenure.

Ravi Gandhi, chief regulatory officer, Bharti Airtel has resigned to pursue career outside the company.