Bajaj Auto Undergoes Organisational Restructuring

The bikemaker has newly appointed a Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) to whom all the managers of other key businesses will report

In a bid to function more efficiently and to fend off competition better, Bajaj Auto has shuffled its organisational structure. The Pune-based bikemaker has appointed Rakesh Sharma as its first CCO to look over all business units.

Eric Vas will continue to head the Motorcycle Business Unit (MBU), Ramesh Maheshwari and Subash Rao will also continue to lead the Intra-city Business Unit (IBU) and Auto Finance Business of Bajaj Finance (BFL-AF) respectively. KS Grihapathy will now lead the Export Business Unit (EBU).

As far as the Probiking Business Unit (PBU) is concerned, Amit Nandi will continue his tenure as the head there, and will also be managing Husqvarna brand apart from KTM, both locally and in the international market. The recently set up Urbanite Business Unit (UBU) will be headed by Sumeet Narang, who will be guided through this financial year by the ex-head Amit Nandi. With the help of the UBU division, Bajaj will debut in the field of urban mobility (read electric vehicles). All the heads of businesses will be reporting to the CCO. This fiscal, Bajaj Auto plans to export 20 lakh vehicles which is about 40 per cent of their production, to over 70 countries globally. Here’s Bajaj MD Rajiv Bajaj’s statement regarding the restructuring:

Internal Circular:

RE-ORGANISING FOR THE FUTURE

‘It takes a whole village to raise a child’ – African saying.

My dear friends & colleagues,

Before I share some good news with you I would like to thank each one of you for your exemplary role in raising Bajaj Auto.

The original Bajaj Auto was a domestic leader that was raised as a low cost manufacturer of licensed technology & products, primarily scooters.

The new Bajaj Auto is a global challenger that has been raised by you to be a focused marketer of its proprietary technology & brands, primarily motorcycles.

This global ride that was announced in November 2001 with the launch of the Pulsar has swiftly brought us today to a position from which we can, in this FY 2019, hope to export 2mn vehicles representing about 40% of our production to over 70 countries across continents.

Being one of the top 2 motorcycle & 3-wheeler brands in most of these markets lends credibility to our claim of being the ‘World’s Favourite Indian’!

I thank you all once again for this rousing achievement!

Our global vantage position reveals before us a complex future combining unyielding competitive forces, intensifying regulatory requirements, and escalating disruptive technologies.

I believe that to continue to succeed we have to continue to strengthen that which lies at the core of our strategy – the alignment between a sharp & nimble front end and a deep & modular back end.

Hence to complement the offices of the ED and the CTO I believe that it is timely to constitute that of a Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) to bring together all our business units in the pursuit of 4 key issues, namely–

• Product harmonisation leading to ‘one world, one product’.
• Marketing synergies creating ‘one brand, one position’.
• Customer focus resulting in ‘one company, one quality’.
• Corporate alignment facilitating ‘one stakeholder, one message’.

Towards this end I am delighted to announce the appointment of Mr. Rakesh Sharma as our first CCO effective immediately!

Accordingly, I am also pleased to announce the following –

• Mr. Eric Vas will continue to lead the Motorcycle Business Unit (MBU), reporting to the CCO.
• Mr. Ramesh Maheshwari will continue to lead the Intra-city Business Unit (IBU), reporting to the CCO.
• Mr. KS Grihapathy will now lead the Export Business Unit (EBU), reporting to the CCO.
• Mr. Subash Rao will continue to lead the Auto Finance Business of Bajaj Finance (BFL-AF), reporting to the CCO.

Furthermore -

• Mr. Amit Nandi will continue to lead the Probiking Business Unit (PBU), reporting to the CCO, and will in addition to managing India for the KTM & Husqvarna brands, also be responsible for all overseas KTM & Husqvarna markets that have been assigned to Bajaj Auto.
• Mr. Sumeet Narang will lead the newly conceived Urbanite Business Unit (UBU), reporting to the CCO, and will be responsible for spearheading our foray into the promising world of urban mobility. In the interest of continuity Sumeet will also be guided through FY19 by Amit who has so far been overseeing this endeavour.

Friends, please join me in heartily congratulating all of them, and in assuring them of our continued support in their new roles.

I feel very confident that each of our Business Heads shall lead us to ever greater heights in the area of their responsibility and that they shall collectively, led by Rakesh, ensure that the outstanding work that we do in design, development, engineering, purchase, and production continues to earn us and our country a worthy name and sincere goodwill worldwide.

Simultaneously, I believe that this re-organisation will permit ED to accord greater focus to our internal operations while equally enabling me to take a couple of steps back from them in order that I may address some other matters that will merit my attention into the future.

With many thanks for your attention, and good wishes,

Rajiv Bajaj

Managing Director

Friday 20th July 2018.