Infosys US head Sandeep Dadlani resigns to pursue personal interests; jolt for Vishal Sikka

Infosys Ltd, India’s second largest software exporter, has been dealt a major blow after Sandeep Dadlani, the company’s American head and global head of manufacturing and retail unit, announced his decision to resign from his post.

In his Linkedin post, Dadlani said, “I will always cherish my 16+ years at Infosys working and learning with some of the best leaders, mentors, colleagues, clients, partners and teams in the industry. I am extremely optimistic of Infosys’ continued success and its strong leadership team. I have decided to pursue my personal interests elsewhere. Next up: An out-of-the world assignment! Stay tuned.”

The decision comes as a serious setback to Infosys’ chief executive officer Vishal Sikka, who recently gave Dadlani the additional responsibility of generating more business from the company’s new software solutions, including the artificial intelligence platform Nia.

Besides being one of the four presidents at Infosys, Dadlani was also the chairman of Edgeverve, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Infosys.

In a press release, Infosys also said that Karmesh Vaswani and Nitesh Banga would be replacing Sandeep Dadlani.

“Sandeep has played a key role in the success of Infosys over his career and in our transformation journey these past three years. We wish him the best in the journey ahead,”. Sikka said in the statement.

Dadlani had joined Infosys in January 2001, and was the top contender in 2015 when the company was looking for a new chief executive officer. However, Infosys rather chose SAP SE board member Vishal Sikka for the CEO’s post.

Infosys has witnessed flurry of resignations at the top ever since Vishal Sikka took over as CEO in August 2014. Nine executives at the rank of executive vice-president (EVP) and above have resigned, while last month Sikka’s former SAP colleague and head of Infosys’s industrial internet business, Gordon Muehl, too resigned, a report in Mint said.