Bharucha becomes acting chief of BBC
London: Dr Chitra Bharucha, a haematologist (a specialist in diseases of the blood and blood-forming organs), of Indian origin has taken charge as the acting chairperson of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and has become the first woman and first Asian to head the broadcasting giant.

The BBC chairman's post fell vacant following the resignation of Michael Grade after he decided to join a rival organisation ITV.

Bharucha was born in Madurai, Tamil Nadu, and has lived in Britain since 1972. She earlier served as deputy director, Northern Ireland Blood Transfusion Service, and consultant clinical haematologist with Belfast City Hospital.

She joined the BBC Broadcasting Council in 1996 for Northern Ireland, in a significant career change and held the position till 2003.
Back to News Review index page  

S Mangat takes addl charge as FACT CMD
Kochi: G S Mangat the chairman and managing director of National Fertilisers is taking additional charge as CMD of Fertilisers and Chemicals Travancore (FACT).

The post fell vacant following the resignation of G C Gopala Pillai last month.

The centrally owned fertiliser PSU had drawn up plans to diversify into new areas by entering into joint ventures for setting up a High Tech Park, Food Park and Defence ancillary Park at Kochi at a total cost of Rs 3,500 crore, FACT sources said.
Back to News Review index page  

Cognizant sees changes it senior level
Chennai: Francisco D'Souza has taken over as IT major Cognizant's CEO from Lakshmi Narayanan, who will now serve on Cognizant's board as vice-chairman. The 38-year-old D'Souza is the youngest CEO of a billion-dollar IT company.

Cognizant hit the billion-dollar mark in December '05, and has given a revenue guidance of $1.4 billion for 2006. Narayanan a software engineer joined TCS in 1975 after his studies at IISc.

From TCS, he moved to Cognizant in 1994, when it was still a part of Dun and Bradstreet. During his stint Cognizant's profits have jumped from $59.4 million in 2003 to $220 million in 2006.

Cognizant's employee strength has grown to over 38,000 people from 9,241 in 2003 while its market cap has grown from $3.1 billion to $11.1 billion in December 2006.

Industry players and observers will be watching how Mr D'Souza takes Cognizant forward.
Back to News Review index page