The Hindu Business Line : Progeon's Bhargava puts in papers

MR Akshaya Bhargava, the Head of Progeon, the business process outsourcing (BPO) subsidiary of Infosys Technologies Ltd, has put in his papers . Reasons for Mr Bhargava's exit were not known immediately.

Infosys did not comment on the development. However, the company may make an official announcement in this regard on Wednesday when it announces the December quarter results. When contacted, Mr Bhargava also declined to comment.

Mr Bhargava had joined Progeon soon after the inception of the company as the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer in November 2002. He had succeeded Mr Phaneesh Murthy, the former sales head of Infosys and head of Progeon then.

At Progeon, Mr Bhargava had led the drive for end-to-end outsourcing and positioned the company to deliver results significantly beyond conventional cost arbitrage, centred on cost, efficiency and process re-engineering improvements.

Progeon in the first six months of this fiscal earned revenues of $38 million as compared to $43 million in the entire last year.

Prior to joining Progeon, Mr Bhargava had served for over 22 years with Citigroup in a variety of senior roles.

Mr Bhargava is credited to have pioneered the creation of Citibank's BPO captive (e-Serve International Ltd) in India in 1991, probably the first instance of end-to-end process outsourcing by a major multinational in India.