Sandip Das

Sandip Das
Born 11 January 1958 (1958-01-11) (age 58)
Cuttack
Alma mater National Institute of Technology Rourkela
Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi Advanced Management Programmme, Harvard Business School, Cambridge, Boston (AMP188)

Sandip Das (born 11 January 1958) is currently the Chairman and Senior Partner with Maitreyi Capital Advisors, a Private Equity and Venture Capital firm focussed initially on Digital Funds. In addition he is also a Senior Advisor to the UK headquartered Telecom consultancy, Analysys Mason, for India and Emerging markets and a member of the Board of Advisors at Astrum, India's first reputation management advisory.

Sandip is one of India's most respected Telecommunications professionals in Asia and an acclaimed Chief Executive. He was one of the founding members of private telephony in India and was part of the group of individuals who founded Hutchison Max Telecom ( now called Vodafone India) in 1994 with a paging business. After spending 13 years building all India operations of the firm, Hutch and Orange brands were successfully launched in India. He left Hutchison Essar Telecom as it was then known in 2006 at which point he was the CEO and Deputy Managing Director of the company besides being on its board as a Director. He subsequently led the Maxis Group of companies in Malaysia as Group CEO overseeing the group's Malaysian ( Maxis), Indian ( Aircel ) , Indonesian ( Axis) and Sri Lankan operations ( Sr Lanka Telecom, Mobitel ) as Board Director. He was also a Board Director with Bridge Alliance.

In 2009, he led Asia's largest Telecom IPO for Maxis raising USD 3.5 billion. In 2012 he was named Malaysian CEO of the year by Finance Asia.

He was then appointed in May 2013 as Managing Director and CEO , Board Director of Mukesh Ambani's Reliance JIO Infocomm.In early 2015 he left the group to study at Harvard Business School.

During his career he appeared four times on the Global List of 100 Most Powerful people in Telecom, compiled by Global Telecom Magazine.

Early life

Sandip Das was born in 1958 in Cuttack, a city in Orissa, an east coast state in India. His father, an aeronautical engineer placed high importance on education and as such, Sandip and his two younger brothers were educated in the finest schools.[1]

He holds a First Class Mechanical Engineering degree from the Regional Engineering College,Rourkela (now known as National Institute of Technology Rourkela) in India and a Masters of Business Administration (MBA) from the Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi.[2] He is also a Harvard alumni having attended the prestigious Advanced Management Programme ( AMP 188 ) at Harvard Business School in 2015.

Career

Das began his career with the Indian consumer durable giant Usha International, Shriram Group, where he started as a Management Trainee and left as Joint Divisional Manager after 10 years of service.[2] He then spent five years as the Franchise Head of Toyota cars and Hino trucks with the Al Futtaim Motors of the Al Futtaim Group in Dubai, UAE.[3]

After returning to India, Das joined Hutchison Essar, then known as Hutchison Max Telecom where he started the company’s operations in 1994 and was its first employee.[4] He spent 13 years in the company, including his time as CEO of Hutchison Max Telecom’s paging division,subsequently made COO of Hutchison Max Telecom in June 1998 where HMTL was an established market leader in Mobile Services and later as the Deputy Managing Director and Director on the Board of Hutchison Essar Limited.[2] During his time with Hutchison, Das helped build the company. In an interview in May 2009, Das said, “I started with Hutchison in 1994. When I left, it had 25 million subscribers. Two months later, the company was sold for US$22 billion to Vodafone. I feel very proud of this achievement as I started the company’s operations from scratch”.[5]

In 2007, Das was appointed the Chief Executive Officer of Maxis Communications Berhad, the largest telecommunications operator in Malaysia.[2][5]

Besides being the Executive Director and CEO of Maxis Communications Berhad, Das also served as Director on the Board of Aircel in India. In addition, Das served the Boards of Sri Lanka Telecom PLC and Mobitel (Sri Lanka) and was also a board member of Bridge Mobile Pte Ltd (Bridge Alliance), a strategic alliance of regional telecommunications provider.[2] He also served for two years on the Board of the Global GSM Development Fund and was the Chairman of the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) Service Industry Panel.[3]

In November 2009, Das led the Maxis’s re-listing on the Malaysian Stock Exchange (Bursa Malaysia) in what was Southeast Asia’s biggest IPO worth over US$3 billion.[6] In 2010, Das led Maxis controlled subsidiary, Aircel in India, in the successful third generation (3G) and broadband wireless access (BWA) spectrum auctions where Aircel successfully bid for 3G spectrum in 13 of the 22 telecom circles in India [7] and BWA spectrum in 8 circles.[8]

In May 2013, he returned to India to head Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries 4G telecom entity, Reliance Jio Infocomm as Managing Director & CEO.

Awards & recognitions

Das is listed in the Global Telecoms Business GTB Power100 list as one of the 100 most powerful people in the telecoms industry worldwide in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2014.[9] In 2012, Sandip was also voted Best CEO in Malaysia by Finance Asia Best Managed Companies Awards 2012.[10] He was recognised as one of the "Spartans of Telecom" by MyMobile (telecom business editorial), credited for bringing global experience to the Indian telecom field.[11] During his tenure with Hutchison India, Das was voted the “CEO of the Year” by Mid Day Publications. Under his leadership, Maxis Malaysia was recognised as one of Malaysia's most valuable brand and Aircel India twice won “The Most Respected Telecom Company” awarded by the Business World.[2]

References

  1. ↑ "Upclose and personal with Sandip Das". Biz.thestar.com.my. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "About Us - Who We Are - People - Senior Management". Maxis. 2009-09-25. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  3. 1 2 Sandip Das. "Sandip Das: Executive Profile & Biography - BusinessWeek". Investing.businessweek.com. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  4. ↑ "Sandip Das to take over as Maxis Malaysia CEO - Telecom - News By Industry - News - The Economic Times". Economictimes.indiatimes.com. 2006-12-06. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  5. 1 2 "Hutch's Sandip Das will be Maxis CEO - Money - DNA". Dnaindia.com. 2006-12-05. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  6. ↑ "Maxis returns in biggest IPO | Daily Express Newspaper Online, Sabah, Malaysia". Dailyexpress.com.my. 2009-11-20. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  7. ↑ "Bharti, RComm & Aircel big winners in 3G auction". Financialexpress.com. 2010-05-20. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  8. ↑ "India's Reliance Industries is surprise winner in BWA spectrum auction - International Business Times". Ibtimes.com. 2010-06-11. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
  9. ↑ "Global Telecoms Business Power100". globaltelecombusiness.com. 2010-09-30. Retrieved 2010-10-14.
  10. ↑ "Best CEO".
  11. ↑ "The Spartans of Telecom". mymobile.co.in.

External links

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