India Beachhead Advisory Board

Pradip Madhavji

Chair

Pradip Madhavji has considerable experience and expertise in travel and tourism, having joined Thomas Cook in 1977. He was the first Indian to lead the company’s operations in India and was the Chairman and Managing Director of the Indian subsidiary for over two decades.
 
Prior to joining Thomas Cook, Pradip worked for Dena Bank where he was in charge of the bank’s entire foreign exchange operations at the time of his departure.
 
Pradip sits on the Boards of a number of leading companies, is a member of the Paris based International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in their Air Transport Committee and the Council for Transport & Logistics, is a president or past president of several professional travel trade and tourism associations and is the recipient of the Kutcha-Ratna, the highest honour bestowed by the community for his leadership qualities and his contribution to the tourism industry.
 
In 2002, Pradip was appointed the New Zealand Honorary Consul based in Mumbai.
 
Read Q&As with Pradip Madhavji

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Peter Baker

 Peter Baker, originally from Dunedin, New Zealand has 30 years international business experience having lived and worked in a number of countries in Asia/Pacific, the UK and Europe.

Peter has recently completed his assignment as CEO, Health and Beauty for the Future Group who are India's largest retailer with over 1,000 stores across 65 cities, 38,000 employees and annual sales of US$3 billion.
 
His responsibilities included covering Health and Beauty across all group formats with specific responsibility to driving private label and private brand development.
 
Prior to joining the Future Group, Peter was CEO of Dabur (H &B Stores) a retail initiative for one of India's largest FMCG companies.
 
Peter has held director level positions for globally recognised businesses including Lee Cooper Ltd, AS Watson Ltd, Poundland PLC and Puma Sportswear.
 
Currently he is the Chairman of ANZBAI (Australian, New Zealand Business Association of India) as well as being active in community based charities.
 
Peter is based in Delhi with his wife and two sons where he has been enjoying the challenge of establishing a market leading business in India.

Watch Peter Baker on TV3’s ASB Business programme

Vijay Crishna

Vijay M. Crishna is the Executive Director of Lawkim Motors Group (Godrej & Boyce Mfg. Co. Ltd.).
 
A graduate in economics from St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi, he handled several major brands, before becoming CEO of Lawkim Ltd taken over by M/s. Godrej in 1977. 
 
In 1991, he formed a joint venture company - Statomat Special Machines, India with Statomat of Germany, Francis Klein, and Lawkim, for manufacturing high precision toolings and machines for motor production.
 
In 1993, he was appointed to the Board of Directors of Godrej-GE Appliances. In 2003, having extended Lawkim’s activities to light engineering and IT enabled services he bought out their American partner’s call centre business in the US Travel vertical.
 
Lawkim has become Lawkim Motors Group after being amalgamated into Godrej & Boyce Mfg. Co. Ltd., with effect from 1 October 2008.
 
He serves on the Board of Trustees of the Bombay Scottish Orphanage Society, and is also a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute for Technology Management, Navi Mumbai. He also serves as an advisor on the President’s International Advisory Board of Colorado College, the United States.

R Ramanan

Ramanan is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of CMC Limited a subsidiary of TCS (Tata Consultancy Services). TCS is one of the world’s leading IT companies and part of the prestigious Tata Group.
 
He has been instrumental in overseeing the transformation of CMC Limited from a public sector government-owned organisation to a global company and has played an important role in spurring computerisation of various business processes in India using indigenous technology.
 
He has led CMC’s focus on large national projects in the areas of education, creating jobs, major e-governance initiatives, the Indian census, government services and defence projects enabling the growth of nationwide infrastructure.
 
Ramanan is the Chairman of CMC Americas Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of CMC in the United States. He is also on the board as Director of E2E Serwiz Solutions Limited, a prestigious BPO (also a Tata Enterprise) based out of Pune, India.
 
He has been responsible for a number of strategic business development initiatives in the United States, the United Kingdom and Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region including Australia, New Zealand and China. He also plays a key role in the Strategy Group of TCS.
He holds a B. Tech in Electrical Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Mumbai and has received national awards for his outstanding achievements and services to the nation.

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Sandeep Tandon

Sandeep Tandon is the Group Advisor to the Reliance Group of Industries. He has also been advising a number of Reliance Group companies and other industrial houses in India.
 
After pursuing a career in the Indian Revenue Service (Income Tax Department), Sandeep quit his government job to study for an L.L.B. from Delhi University. He has been practising in the field of Taxation, Exchange Control and other Corporate Laws since.
 
Sandeep has a Masters in Political Science from Allahabad University (1971). In 1991, he also did a Post Graduate Diploma in International Tax Law at Robert Kennedy University, Switzerland.