Vishal Sikka is the new CEO of Infosys – Congratulations Vishal, Infosys and SAP

I did not think Vishal will take the job – but I saw the news now.

First off – Congratulations Vishal ! I wish you the very best in the new job. I hope you get to revive the fortunes of infosys and take them to new heights. 

For Vishal, I think this is a good move . He gets to be CEO of one of the biggest brand names in IT. It is a bit of a surprise for me that a guy with his roots in product and technology chose to take the lead of a big services company. I am suspecting this means infosys is going to focus seriously on products going forward. Knowing Vishal’s big thinking abilities, I assumed he won’t go to start ups. He definitely needs a larger canvas – which I guess explains him joining infosys. But what I really expected to see for next few years is to see him be a partner in a top tier VC firm investing in the technologies of tomorrow. Guess that needs to wait.

For infosys, I think this is definitely a benefit – and surely so in short term from an investor’s point of view. Vishal’s forte is innovation – and infosys needs a new strategy. I think investors will reward infosys in near term for scoring such a big brand hire. Long term – we need to wait and see.

Vishal is not a services sales guy, and he is not an operations guy. But he is terrific with customers and he knows the who is who in technology and is close to many CXOs at customers . So yes, this could work very well for Infy if he builds a team around him that knows the services business well, and has operational excellence. It also helps him that most of the current infosys leadership team is stepping down before he takes over. Vishal gets a clean start – much like Bill McDermott got a clean start at SAP with a new(ish) team . Win or lose – its on him now. No pressure, eh? 🙂

But then leadership team can only do so much – it is on the infoscions rank and file to make the shift to an innovation agenda. Vishal moves at a speed that is hard to keep up with, and he is not exactly a process oriented dude – I know that first hand. So my suggestion to infosys employees is to get some rest while you can, and then be ready for a wild ride 🙂

So what about SAP ? this is an interesting development for SAP. Infosys is an important partner for SAP – and infosys has a lot of services business on SAP technologies and products. I imagine the partnership will grow even stronger now. Although Vishal probably can’t poach talent from SAP legally, he has a cult following in some sections of SAP. It would not surprise me to see some of my former colleagues jump from SAP to Infosys soon. 

Good luck again, V !