Premji says son Rishad will not be CEO of Wipro

Information technology czar and Wipro Chairman Azim Premji has said his son Rishad would never be the chief executive of his company, but will represent promoter ownership on the board of directors.

Rishad, 35, joined Wipro in 2007 as business head for special projects in the banking and financial services vertical and rose to become chief strategy officer three years later.

Premji, who founded Wipro, said becoming CEO was not the career path for the eldest of his two sons.

“He (Rishad) is not going to be the CEO, that's not the career plan for him but he would be representing ownership, obviously,” Premji said in television interviews on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum here. He directly owns 3.7 per cent in the company, while entities related to him own another 74 per cent. Rishad has direct ownership of 0.03 per cent shares in Wipro.

Rishad has for long been speculated to be a natural choice for taking over the operations.

Prior to joining Wipro, Rishad, a management graduate from Harvard Business School, worked with Bain & Co, working across segments like consumer products, automobiles, telecom and insurance.

Asked about succession plans, Premji said, "We are always working with succession planning. It was right from the top to senior management level and that is the key responsibility of the board.”

Hinting at a bigger role for CEO T K Kurien, Premji said Kurien “certainly” could become the managing director.

“We have T K Kurien now in charge. So, very obviously he has taken over from me the mantle of the chief executive officer's role... He certainly stands a chance of becoming the managing director. Our restructuring is going to make some changes,” he said.