South African telecom operator Neotel has appointed Sunil Joshi as the company’s new Managing Director and CEO, with effect from 1 April 2011. Mr Joshi, currently President of Global Enterprise Solutions for Tata Communications, replaces Ajay Pandey who will move to back to Tata Communications after completing five years with Neotel.
Commenting on the change of leadership, Neotel’s non-executive Chairman, N. Srinath said:
“Sunil brings with him extensive experience in the global Enterprise segment as well as expertise in global managed and network services. He is strongly positioned to take Neotel forward along with the changing needs of the market, as enterprise customers shift their focus more towards managed services, in line with global trends.”
Kennedy Memani, Chairman of Nexus Communications and the BEE partner in Neotel said: “Neotel has built the basic foundation to be a strong player in the South African telecom space and to serve the needs of its customers. As Neotel matures in a market that’s structure and competitive dynamics have changed, it has to be focused on a sharper vision that is underpinned by a robust corporate strategy and supporting values. While the realignment process has begun to deliver on that, Sunil and his team will ultimately be responsible for driving Neotel’s growth over the next few years.”
Sunil Joshi has replaced Ajay Pandey, who will move back to Tata Communications after completing five years with Neotel.
Ajay Pandey said: “It has been a privilege and a great challenge to lead Neotel during the first four years of its operation, during which time we have invested over R3.5bn in infrastructure and played a major role in increasing South Africa’s global connectivity. We began a start-up operation in the managed liberalisation era that had one strong fixed line operator, three mobile operators and a host of value-added service providers. We then had to adapt to operating in a wholly liberalised environment. Neotel has built a strong wholesale offering as the back-end service provider to other operators, supplying broadband services and contributing to lower broadband prices for a range of customers. Neotel offers a unique value proposition to enterprises, providing the most stable, productive and efficient network of any telecommunications operator in South Africa. I have every confidence that it will be a competitive challenger in the South African market.”
There were speculations in the past few weeks that Neotel, 56% owned by Tata, was in serious financial trouble, even informing its staff that retrenchment were possible this year.
