Larsen and Toubro shareholders will have to wait till the first week of April 2012 for the announcement of a new Chairman and Managing Director, said Mr A.M. Naik, the current CMD, at the company's 66 Annual General Meeting on Friday.

On September 1, 2012, Mr Naik steps down as the CMD of the country's largest private sector engineering company, which on Friday had a market cap of over Rs 60,000 crore.

“A succession plan is in place and a new leadership structure would be announced by April 2012. A high powered nomination committee is working on that. The company's board is seized with the matter,” he said.

Mr Naik said a number of senior directors will also be retiring soon and this is a matter of concern, “Therefore, we are bringing new talent faster and getting them trained at best global universities like Harvard. Getting the right talent is one of the biggest challenges, which the company is now facing,” he said.

He said L&T Group has 64 businesses, which is getting very difficult to manage. Therefore, they are being split into nine verticals, each with own internal board and independent directors. The verticals will continue to function as divisions of the company, until they are listed.

Interacting with the media after the AGM, Mr Naik said due to the Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, nuclear power companies globally are placing fewer orders and contracts for engineering goods. Therefore, L&T joint venture with Nuclear Power Corporation of India for producing nuclear forgings is now looking at other forging business, he said.

In November, 2009 both companies had entered a joint venture for producing special steels and ultra heavy forgings at Hazira near Surat.

Mr Naik added that the facility would be operational by end of the fiscal but it will have to look for forging contracts from hydro-carbon and steel industry, he said.

Shares of L&T ended at Rs 1,531.35 per share on the BSE, down 0.99 per cent over the previous close.

> rahulw@thehindu.co.in

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