V.S. Shridhar Senior VP, Global Enterprise Solutions, Tata Communications

V.S. Shridhar, senior vice-president (VP), global enterprise solutions, Tata Co­mmunica­tions, brings to the table over 25 years of ex­pe­r­ience in various functions inc­l­uding enterprise sales, in­ter­na­tional mergers and acquisitions, project management, start-up management and sales management in the IT and telecom industry. He started his career as a sales manager with Wipro Infotech, later moving to IBM India, where he worked for seven years in sales leadership and product marketing roles. He joined Tata Internet Services in 2000 as general manager. In 2002, he started the enterprise business division at Tata Com­m­u­nica­tions when the Tata Group took over Videsh Sanchar Nigam Limi­ted. In 2007, he was appointed chief operating officer of Tata Communi­c­a­tions Trans­for­ma­tion Services.

In his current role, Shri­dhar is responsible for maintaining Tata Communica­tions’ leadership position in the communications solutions space for large enterprises. His im­me­diate challenge is to be ready with the network requir­ed to support the push coming from the government through various inclusion projects like Digital India, Jan Dhan, mo­bile governance and Skill India, and also to support the growing cloud partner ecosystem. “As customers adopt cloud services, they will need a provider on whom they can depend to manage not only the new environment but also the existing one,” he says.

Shridhar is of the view that increasing digitisation, growth in wearable technology and on-demand content will emer­ge as the key growth drivers for the industry in the future. He sees opportunities in traditional sectors like banking and finance, IT and IT-enabled services and manufacturing, as also new sectors like e-commerce and health care.

Sridhar’s main strengths are his organisational abilities and communication skills. Describing his management style, he says, “I show full trust in my employees, while giving them realistic targets to achieve.” A mechanical engineering graduate from MS University of Baroda, Shri­dhar also has a postgraduate diploma in management in marketing from XLRI, Jam­shed­pur. A Fulbright scho­lar, he has completed an executive leadership progra­mme at Car­negie Mellon Un­iver­sity, USA. His favourite books include Michio Kaku’s Physics of the Future and The Future of the Mind. In his spare time, he likes to listen to TED talks, meditate, play golf and spend time with his family, which includes his wife and their two children.