Meet the 63-year old making a comeback as Tech Mahindra's CFO

• Milind Kulkarni is returning as the CFO of the $5.2 billion Indian IT services company Tech Mahindra starting April 2.
• The man who began his professional journey at Cadbury after becoming a qualified chartered accountant has been with Tech Mahindra for 18 and a half years now.
• His last stint as CFO of Tech Mahindra was between 2013 and 2018 before he retired to become a Senior Advisor.

He’s been here before and he’s set to make a comeback — the qualified chartered accountant, Milind Kulkarni, will be returning as Tech Mahindra’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) in the next financial year.

During his last stint as CFO, Kulkarni was at helm from 2013 to 2018. After his five year tenure was over, rather than leave the company, Kulkarni stuck around and served as a Senior Advisor for the IT services giant.

In fact, Kulkarni’s been with Tech Mahindra for 18 and a half years now.

When he first took up the post of CFO, the company was at the cusp of merging with its subsidiary Mahindra Satyam. This time around, Tech Mahindra is waiting on the boom from 5G to spur revenue growth and expand margins. Management expects that the gains from 5G will start flowing in during the second half of 2021.

Kucch meetha ho jaye (let’s get something sweet)
Before going on to become a chartered accountant in 1981, Kulkarni completed his Bachelor’s in Commerce from the ML Dahanukar College of Commerce in Mumbai.

His first job was in the offices of Cadbury as a Manager of Accounts. After a brief stint at Standard Batteries after Cadbury, he moved onto become the General Manager of Finance at Mastek Limited, a software company that has a presence in the US and UK in addition to India.

In another big career jump, Kulkarni went onto become the Group CFO of Venkateshwara Hatcheries — also known as the massive poultry brand Venky’s — in 1997.

It was only in 2002 that he finally found his way to Tech Mahindra.

Starting out as the Vice President of Finance, Kulkarni rose in the ranks to become the CFO in 2013. And in 2021, he’s making his comeback.

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