Reliance Industries on Friday announced the appointment of Srikanth Venkatachari as Chief Financial Officer effective June 1. According to a stock exchange filing by the company, Srikanth will take over from Alok Agarwal, who has been CFO since 2005 and now has been appointed senior advisor to company chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani.
Srikanth Venkatachari, 57, has been the Joint Chief Financial Officer of Reliance since 2011. He has been with Reliance for the last 14 years. Previously, he worked with Citibank, where he was in forex trading and derivatives and later became the head of markets.
Alok Agarwal, 65, who joined Reliance in 1993, completed 30 years with the company.
"Agarwal, Chief Financial Officer of the company will assume a new role as Senior Advisor to the Chairman and Managing Director of the company assisting him on a wide range of strategic issues with effect from June 1, 2023, after 30 years of distinguished service," the filing said.
Agarwal was appointed as the CFO of the company in 2005. "The Board appreciated Alok Agarwal for his contribution in the transformative journey of the company," it added.
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According to a report by MoneyControl, Alok Agarwal has studied at IIT Kanpur and IIM Ahmedabad. He joined Reliance Industries in 1993. Prior to RIL, he had worked with Bank of America for 12 years.
The report says Agarwal was crucial to RIL's exponential expansion during the last 30 years. Reliance had a balance sheet size of Rs 6,100 crore and an annual turnover of Rs 4,100 crore when he joined. The company's sales increased by roughly 240 times while he was CFO. In FY22, RIL became the first firm in India to cross $100 billion in annual turnover, and in the first nine months of FY23, it has already reached $90 billion. By the end of September 2022, the size of the balance sheet had increased by 260 times, to over Rs 16.25 lakh crore.