MindTree appoints Albert Hieronimus as chairman

IT firm MindTree yesterday announced the appointment of Albert Hieronimus as the company's new chairman, following Ashok Soota's resignation. The appointment takes effect from today.

With a new chairman on board, the mid-sized technology firm said it would restructure business in order to bring clearer focus to business and help the firm achieve a billion-dollar topline in its "second phase" of growth.

Hieronimus was till now an independent director on the company's board. According to MindTree, the decision was unanimous and the board would be able to leverage Albert's international exposure to improve business.

According to Hieronimus, the company wanted to add a second chapter to MindTree's success story and the immediate priority was to bring the company on track over the next 10 years. He added the company would undertake a revision of its strategy, which would be discussed in its next board meeting.

The company, he said, would focus more on select segments. MindTree would target five key verticals, including banking and financial services, manufacturing, media, retail and travel while reducing exposure to other sectors over time.

According to analysts, this meant the company would be dropping a few businesses. Within its IT services businesses, it would stop focusing on energy and utilities and in its product engineering services (PES) portfolio, the company would no longer focus on medical electronics.

There would be realignments within product engineering services (PES), which had three businesses, including research and development services, next-in-wireless and software product engineering.