Aditya Birla Head of Strategy to switch to Tata Sons as CFO

Tata Sons on Monday announced appointment of Saurabh Agrawal to a newly created position of Group Chief Financial Officer to drive the over $100 billion salt-to-software conglomerate's capital allocation decisions and investment management.

Currently Aditya Birla Group's Head of Strategy, Agrawal will join Tata Sons with effect from July 2017, the company said in a statement.

His appointment comes three months after N Chandrasekaran took charge as the chairman of Tata Sons -- the promoter of major operating Tata companies.

Earlier, Ishaat Hussain was the Finance Director of Tata Sons from 2000 but after he became a non-executive director in 2012 on attaining 65 years of age, the role remained vacant. Chandrasekaran said: "He brings deep capital markets knowledge and valuable cross-industry experience to this critical leadership role in the Tata group."

His expertise will help Tata group in driving rigour and synergy in capital allocation decisions, investment management as well as consolidation and optimisation of the group's business portfolio, Chandrasekaran added.

An IIT Roorkee and IIM Calcutta alumni, Agrawal has over two decades of experience in the industry. He is among the leading investment bankers of India.

Agrawal was also the head of the corporate finance unit of Standard Chartered Bank in India and South Asia, and the head of the investment banking division in DSP Merrill Lynch.