Vishal Sikka seeks ‘Bhishma Pitamaha’ Murthy’s guidance to steer growth
BENGALURU: The 34th annual general meeting (AGM) of Infosys started with a dramatic flourish that had the company’s first non-founder CEO Vishal Sikka touching the feet of its most famous co-founder NR Narayana Murthy. Murthy, who variously has been Infosys’ chairman, chairman emeritus and chief mentor, was on Monday bestowed with a new title: Bhishma Pitamaha.
Murthy, in turn was unstinting in his praise of Sikka saying that everybody should support the CEO in his vision to make Infosys a $20-billion dollar company by 2020. The high visibility bonhomie and camaraderie seem to put a lid on speculation swirling in Bengaluru’s tech circles about strained rVishal Sikka seeks ‘Bhishma Pitamaha’ Murthy’s guidance to steer growthelations between Murthy and the new management of the company.
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Murthy, who attended the AGM with wife Sudha Murty and son Rohan Murty, said Sikka was a great leader who has rolled out a number of initiatives that would push the company’s performance into a higher growth orbit. “He has set an ambitious target for 2020. I’m extremely happy and I think he’s a great leader. He has aspirational targets. We should all support him, we should all pray that he succeeds. I wish (Sikka) the best for the future,” said Murthy. Sikka had articulated an ambitious target of touching $20 billion in revenue at a 30% operating margin and $80,000 revenue per employee by 2020. The company ended the last fiscal with an operating margin of 26% and revenue per employee of $52,500.
Even as shareholders present at the AGM clamoured for Murthy’s return as an independent director and mentor, the company’s chairman R Seshasayee said “He (Murthy) is our mentor, for all of us. Whether he sits this side or that side, he is our ‘Bhishma Pitamaha’ and we’ll reach out to him when required.” Sikka, too, spoke in a similar vein when he spoke about Murthy and the values he inculcated around learnability. “As Sesh said, (Murthy’s) the Bhishma Pitamah for all of us, we’re very excited to see him always and I was actually very happy to see him.”
Murthy said the company is in safe hands with a new management at the helm after the last of the co-founders Kris Gopalakrishnan retired from the firm last year. “The reality is that today we have a very good set of people running the company — they should run the company, we should all support them, we should cheer them from outside, so there’s no need for anybody from outside to get back into Infosys. I’m very happy, so I don’t need to ask (Sikka) any questions,” Murthy said.
Investors and shareholders had expressed concerns over the $8.7 billion firm’s growth that lagged peers in a challenging year when its revenue grew 7.1% in the 2014-15 fiscal, just about meeting the lower end of its guidance of 7%-9%.
But Sikka articulated his renew and new strategy that would catapult the company’s growth to achieve 10%-12% revenue growth in constant currency for 2015-16 financial year. At the heart of Sikka’s strategy is renewing the core business to enhance the competitiveness of current service lines by leveraging automation, innovation and artificial intelligence.
[“source – timesofindia.indiatimes.com”]