Azim Premji, 60, owns more than 80% of Bangalore-based Wipro, India's third largest software exporter, which had annual revenues of $1.8 billion in 2005. Forbes magazine reckons that his net worth exceeds $13 billion, and it places him at No. 25 in its most recent ranking of the world's richest people. In the first of a two-part interview with Knowledge@Wharton, Premji speaks with Ravi Aron, a professor of operations and information management at Wharton, about Wipro's reorganization last year following the departure of its former CEO; why the company chose to move to an organizational structure based on so-called verticals; how Wipro's business operations are changing; and the challenges the company faces in recruiting and building management talent. Pratik Kumar, Wipro's head of human resources, joined Premji in answering some questions. The second part of the interview will appear in the next edition of Knowledge@Wharton.
Aron: After Vivek Paul [Wipro's former CEO] left the company last year, you made radical changes in your organizational structure. How did they affect your markets and your vision for where Wipro is going?
Premji: The most important thing you must appreciate is that, with the reorganization, we tried to bring Wipro's leadership closer to the customer. In the process, we tried to de-layer the organization and empower our business leaders with a much higher degree of P&L and growth responsibility. That is why we removed an entire layer which was there previously. Our executives are seasoned enough in their jobs and they have performed long enough in their roles to be confident that they can deliver results through the new structure.
The reorganization also brought the mainstream of the company, which is really our global technology business, closer in alignment with the original corporate staff, which has now become our business staff.
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