Gopichand Katragadda, the chief technology officer (CTO) of Tata Group has expectedly stepped down from his role. He joined the company as the CTO on 3rd August 2014, reporting to the chairman Mr. Cyrus P. Mistry.
In his role, Katragadda was responsible for technology at the group level and shared his expertise in managing R&D operations. Also, he looked after cross-company synergies, created technology strategies for white spaces, and acted as an evangelist for innovation across group companies.
However, when the present chairman N Chandrasekaran brought in Aarti Subramanian from TCS as the chief digital officer, Katragadda’s future remained in a doubt. According to the sources, Katragadda has shifted back to Bengaluru. He was living in Mumbai during the tenure of his job as a technologist for his assignment with the Tata Group since August 2014.
Along with this, the Tata Group saw a resignation of an MS and Ph.D. holder in electrical engineering from Iowa State University as well who was from its holding company Tata Sons.
It is being clearly witnessed that executives hired by or who are close to Mistry have been quitting from the company after the boardroom battle between the former chairman and Ratan Tata broke out in October 2016.
Many executives have made an exit from the conglomerate as of now. Apart from Katragadda, the others include Mukund Rajan (who used to oversee ethics at the conglomerate) and Rakesh Sarna (former Indian Hotels CEO).
Chandrasekaran has been filling up these roles either by bringing on board candidates from TCS or by recruiting external professionals. Tata Group seems to be in their bad phase as most of the important executives are stepping down and leaving the conglomerate.