Twenty-eight years after joining HCL Technologies,, Vineet Nayar on Thursday stepped down from the post of CEO, paving the way for the next generation of leadership to take the company through the next phase of growth.

Nayar joined HCL in 1985 after earning his MBA from XLRI. He founded Comnet, where he incubated the remote infrastructure management (RIM) industry in 1993, which is today a multi-billion dollar IT outsourcing segment.

It was at Comnet that Nayar developed and implemented many ground-breaking policies and practices, which later became core to HCL Tech’s ‘employees first, customers second’ philosophy.

The company made an initial public offering in December 1999 and trading in the stock commenced on January 11, 2000.

In 2005, Nayar became President of the company and during the next five years the company tripled in revenue and employee base.

The company today employs over 85,000 people across the globe and continues to expand in size and scale under Nayar’s leadership, which has only strengthened after his appointment in 2007 as the CEO and Vice-Chairman in November 2010.

During this time, HCL Tech joined companies like Apple and Google as one of only eight technology companies in the world with revenues above $2.5 billion, achieving a compound annual growth rate of more than 25 per cent.

However, in June 2012, Nayar sold his entire stake in the company for Rs 133.58 crore and used the money for his non-profit organisation Sampark.

He continues his innings in the company as Vice-Chairman and Joint Managing Director.

>ronendrasingh.s@thehindu.co.in

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