Swaminathan Dandapani is set to become the next chief executive of Infosys BPO, the back office unit of India’s second-biggest software exporter, a senior company official confirmed on Monday.

Mr Dandapani, currently a senior vice-president and head of global services delivery at Infosys BPO, will take over from Amitabh Chaudhry who quit the company in November last year and will serve the company till January 15.

Infosys BPO will also have a new chief operating officer (COO), at least two persons familiar with these appointments confirmed to ET on Tuesday. Ritesh M Idnani, a member of Infosys BPO executive council, will take over as COO and help the back office unit meet its operational goals. One of the persons told ET that the company has already issued an internal communication regarding these appointments last week.

When contacted by ET on Monday, TV Mohandas Pai, Infosys BPO board member, confirmed that the company has found a new CEO and a COO for its back office division, but declined to elaborate any further.

“You’ll have to wait for the results day,” he said. “We have a process of leadership selection where we put up an internal job posting and all those who are eligible are invited to apply. The board can also appoint a CEO but it rarely does that. This process gives everybody a fair chance,” Mr Pai said.

Those who apply and meet the performance criteria are then invited to make a presentation and interviewed by a panel, which then shortlists the most suitable candidates. In this case, since Infosys BPO is a wholly-owned subsidiary with its own board, the panel recommends the shortlisted candidates to the Infosys BPO for acceptance.

“Infosys has been following this process for that last four and a half years. It is a novel way to groom leaders because creates internal competition,” Mr Pai said. Executives in the parent company, Infosys Technologies, are also eligible to apply for leadership positions in BPO and vice-versa. The company is expected to make a formal announcement about these appointments on January 12, when it announces its third quarter earnings.

Infosys BPO, which counts Royal Philips Electronics and BT among its top customers has revenues of around $300 million and over 17,000 professionals on its payroll.

Both Mr Swaminathan and Mr Idnani are former Infosys Technologies executives, who moved to the BPO arm. Mr Swaminathan is currently senior vice-president at Infosys BPO heading customer services, finance and accounting, procurement, and human resource outsourcing. “He was playing the role of a de facto COO,” said person familiar with Infosys BPO.

While Mr Dandapani started his career with IBM and has been with Infosys BPO for over five years, Mr Idani is based in the US as the vice-president of sales and marketing.  Source

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