Oracle top bosses quit en masse

[hariharan]

After Microsoft India, it’s the world’s largest ERP company Oracle India which is facing a crisis at the top.

According to sources, about six to seven executives from the top team including the HR head, national sales and technology sales head have put in their papers, leaving the company’s most important verticals almost headless.

When contacted by ET, an Oracle India official confirmed the movements but said many of the exits were for personal reasons. According to confirmed sources, director-sales Prabodh Tiwari, vicepresident of technology sales SPS Grover, HR head Radhika Mitra, channels head Anand Mohan, director - sales support S Kharbanda have put in their papers leaving almost nobody to realise revenues for the company in its top units. Oracle India MD Krishan Dhawan was not available for comment.

According to industry sources, there are multiple reasons for the huge attrition at the top level. The main reason is too much churn at the Asia Pacific level, the headquarter of Oracle India.

Bad culture management after Oracle’s acquisition of BEA is touted to be another reason. Apparently, the $8.5 billion takeover made many executive roles redundant in Oracle. Another reason for sales people quitting is the less than committed revenues from a transaction with a government department.

Most people who have quit have gone to Oracle’s rivals like IBM, SAP and Microsoft. But Microsoft itself is reeling under a crisis as many of the unit heads have left and many have been transferred to other roles. It seems that like Microsoft, Oracle could also see a flurry of top executives flying down to India to check things on the ground.

Microsoft India has seen a bunch of top honchos like the COO Kevin Turner and senior VP of Microsoft International Jean Philippe Courtois coming to India in a span of two months.

According to sources, the problem in Oracle India stemmed from bad HR management on the part of the company. “The company is spending large amounts of money in acquiring companies but not paying the employees adequately.

In other IT companies, executive of the same level command almost 1.5-1 .8 times. Too much churn at the Asia Pacific level has also made employees shift loyalties,” said a source close to the development.

After the buyout of BEA, Steve Au-Yeung of BEA took over as the SVP - Asia Pacific from the earlier Asia Pacific head Brian Mitchell who has moved out of the company. This changed the whole reporting structure of the company.