 "Vishal Sikka exits Infosys: The story so far")
The heightened acrimony between Infosys’ board and cohort of founders came to a head on Friday, with the resignation of CEO Vishal Sikka.
August 2014: Vishal Sikka, former SAP AG executive board member, takes over from S D Shibulal as Infosys CEO to revive the company’s fortunes which was losing market share
February 2016: Board decides to extend Sikka’s tenure by two years to 2021
February 10: Co-founder Narayana Murthy dubs hefty severance pay to former chief financial officer Rajiv Bansal as “hush money”, says governance standards at Infosys are dropping
Board denies any lapses, appoints law firm of Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas to receive inputs from promoters and make recommendations
February 12: Market regulator Sebi received a letter from an anonymous whistle-blower claiming wrongdoing in Infosys’ acquisition of Israeli tech firm Panaya
February 20: Infosys and Sikka strongly refute the claims made by whistle-blower but call in a law firm to conduct an investigation
April 21: Infosys co-founders, former board members say Vishal Sikka’s $20 billion revenue target was aspirational and not achievable, and has done more harm than good as analysts use the metric to rate the company
June 8: Infosys dumps Sikka’s target of $20-bn in revenues, 30% operating margin and $80,000 revenue per employee by March 2021 to address criticism, especially from Murthy
July 8: Murthy writes to Infosys board to make Panaya investigation report public
August 18: Sikka resigns as MD & CEO, citing “unrelenting, baseless/malicious and increasingly personal attacks”
Board blames Murthy’s “continuous assault” as the primary reason for Sikka’s resignation
Murthy hits back saying it’s below his dignity to respond to such baseless insinuations
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