Matt KendallAnkur Prakash, Wipro’s Vice-President of New growth and Emerging Markets, and one of the Nearshore industry’s most influential leaders, has resigned from his position at the global IT services provider.
The exit is the second high-level resignation from Wipro in the last two months, following the departure of Jeffrey Heenan Jalil, head of healthcare and life sciences, in August.
“Ankur Prakash has resigned from the company after deciding to take a career break,” said a spokesperson from the company, as cited by LiveMint.
Under Ankur’s management, Wipro’s manufacturing division amassed impressive revenues of US$701 million in 2017-18, representing around 8.7% of the company’s total global income of US$8.06 billion.
Wipro has assigned two executives to take over Ankur’s responsibilities – Anand Padmanabhan, President and Global Head of Strategic Sales and Geographies, will oversee the Latin American business, while Milan Rao, Communications Head and President, will manage manufacturing.
Ankur spent over 20 years of his career as Vice President and COO at rival Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), spending 6 years of that time in the Country Director role for Mexico, Canada, and Caribbean.
During that time he was credited with widening and bolstering the company’s operations in the nearshore region, including some big wins in Mexico. He launched several delivery centers in the region, gaining numerous customers in sectors like mining, media, financial services, and government.
Following his exit, his responsibilities were consolidated and passed to Henry Manzano, CEO of TCS Latin America, based in Santiago, Chile.
He became head of Wipro’s emerging market business in August, 2015, and was the second TCS executive to join Wipro that year after former-TCS VP Abidali Neemuchwala became COO in March.
Six other TCS executives followed soon after, during an unprecedented migration of leadership within India’s IT services industry.
Just seven months after his inauguration, Ankur joined Wipro’s decision-making committee in February 2016, chaired by Neemuchwala, who was subsequently promoted to CEO in the same month. The committee is responsible for identifying future growth prospects, defining the company’s strategy, and formulating methods to implement it.
Ankur has featured numerous times in Nearshore Americas over the years and was a guest speaker at Nexus in both 2011 and 2014. His quotes still ring true to this day, highlighting his continuous support and advocacy for the industry.
“There are lot of opportunities and talent available in Latin America. We have to leverage these advantages and provide the kind of service we were not able to provide yesterday,” he said, in a video interview.
Nearshore Americas reached out to Ankur for comments on his departure, but has not received a reply as yet.
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