Speculations were rife on Thursday (March 13, 2009) that Manoj Kohli, CEO of Bharti Airtel, was on his way out. The rumors started with the news that he sold his entire 1,23,000 shares of Bharti Airtel. As a result company’s share price fell by 5%. It was difficult for him to explain that he was not resigning.

Later in the day, the company issued a press release that Sanjay Kapoor had been elevated as deputy CEO. He will now assume day to day responsibility. We are reproducing the press release issued by the company so that the readers will themselves be able to understand the difference.

Press Release:

Bharti Airtel Limited today announced key apex level organisational changes aimed at laying the foundation for the company’s next phase of growth. The new structure has been designed to manage future growth opportunities, exploit scale & building cost synergies, while continuing to derive advantage from on- the- ground focus on sales and enhanced levels of customer service.  

Making the announcement Mr. Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman & Managing Director, Bharti Airtel said “Over the last couple of years, we have been able to build a world-class organisation. The company has grown not just in terms of revenue and market share but also in terms of strengthened processes, capabilities and governance. It has been our endeavour to empower our top management team, which has performed very well and is amongst the finest in the telecom world. Today, we have taken another step in further empowering the top management team and laid a strong foundation for embarking on the next phase of our exciting growth journey.”

Manoj Kohli, CEO & Joint Managing Director, Bharti Airtel will increasingly focus on strategy development, governance and organisation development. He will lead the overall transformation programme including creation of factories and shared services with the objective of building the right capabilities to enable the company succeed in the next phase of its growth. He will also provide additional focus on building the B2B powerhouse.

Sanjay Kapoor has been elevated from President – Mobile Services to a newly created position of Deputy CEO. In his new role, Sanjay will lead the Mobile, Telemedia and DTH businesses. Sanjay will report to Manoj Kohli.

Having led the transformation at the Telemedia business, Atul Bindal will take over as President – Mobile Services. K Srinivas who was Executive Director (East) – Mobile Services and in-charge of Sri Lanka operations will take over as Joint President - Telemedia Services. New business verticals such as M-commerce and M-entertainment etc. are being created to generate new revenue streams.

Atul and K Srinivas will report to Sanjay Kapoor.

David Nishball will continue as President - Enterprise Services and will report to Manoj Kohli. On the Enterprise side, the company’s aim is to build a B2B powerhouse over the next 5 years with enhanced focus on global wholesale voice and data, advanced Enterprise voice & mobility services, Enterprise solutions, Managed services and lead industry transformation projects.