Madhavan is a strategic business leader, with significant experience working with Tatas, Wipro and Reliance, in establishing and incubating new ventures; driving strategic growth and profitability of large business units; group strategic growth planning; managing international partner relationships, acquisitions & integration and financing of ventures. As an Independent Director and Member of various Audit, NRC, CSR and Risk Management committees in listed entities, Madhavan now adds immense value in guiding leadership teams and inculcating best governance practices.
•Madhavan started his career with ICICI, where he honed his project financing and appraisal skills through financing of various new business ventures and growth plans in diverse sectors like textiles, steel, fertilizers, and predominantly technology business. Madhavan coordinated a landmark financing line from the World Bank to ICICI, for financing new technology ventures in India, which resulted in over 20 Global companies setting up India operations.
•As part of the Group Chairman’s Office in Tatas, Madhavan was responsible for the strategic business management of the new business portfolio of Tatas including establishment and management of joint ventures with IBM, Lucent, Bell Canada, Changi Airport and SIA amongst others. Representing the Chairman in all JV Committees, Madhavan led the JV entities business strategy and growth working in tandem with the JV CEO and team, as also their ongoing annual plan cycles and performance reviews. Madhavan’s main responsibilities included facilitating hiring of CFO & other CXO level resources, establishing JV business processes across functions and oversight on commercial contracts, compliances and raising financing for the venture. Madhavan led the landmark merger of Tatas-AT&T-Birla (now Vi) and the divesture of 20% stake in Tata Industries to Jardine Matheson. Madhavan has been closely involved in crafting policies as he worked with the Chairman who was involved in drafting the New Telecom Policy of 1999 and was the Chairman of Council on Trade & Industry, in submission of Infrastructure Development Report to the Prime Minister, and hence gained good exposure to multiple infrastructure industries.
•After Tatas, Madhavan joined a startup in ITES where he was responsible for blending application outsourcing in addition to leveraging remote processing capabilities for Global customers. Madhavan led the strategic sale of this business to Wipro, and moved on to be responsible for acquisitions & integration for Wipro Technologies. Madhavan also led the comprehensive financial management and controllership oversight support to the various business units of Wipro Technologies across geographies, service practices and industry verticals. Madhavan moved on to be CFO with an entity acquired by Thomas Lee Putnam-GIC Singapore, with specific responsibility to facilitate value creation through growth and acquisitions and post the transaction, he moved to join Reliance.
•At Reliance, Madhavan spent his initial years as CFO and established robust governance practices covering business planning, corporate controllership, taxation, audit and compliances, risk management, and business finance support to multiple business units. Madhavan then took responsibility for the Grocery business working with various CEOs of this segment and guided teams to achieve group objectives. Madhavan was directly responsible or closely involved in all aspects including merchandising, store operations, new store builds, technology, people policies and planning and performance management. After managing private label and specific new business development initiatives, Madhavan’s last role was as Head of the Grocery eCommerce B2C business, where he built a new organization from scratch which is now the core of Reliance’s grocery ecommerce business.
•Madhavan is an alumnus of BITS, Pilani and IIM, Calcutta, and lives in Navi Mumbai