Mr. B. Prasada Rao appointed Director (IS&P), BHEL

On his appointment as Director on the Board of Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), Mr. B. Prasada Rao, 53, has assumed charge as Director (Industrial Systems & Products) of the Navratna Public Sector engineering and manufacturing enterprise, here today.

Prior to this, he was heading the company’s Industry Business segment as Executive Director. A Mechanical Engineer from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Andhra Pradesh and a Post Graduate in Industrial Engineering from NITIE, Mumbai. Mr. Rao joined BHEL as an Industrial Engineer in 1978. He has 29 years of diversified and versatile professional experience through working in major segments of BHEL.

As General Manager, Corporate Planning & Development, he successfully led two Corporate Plan exercises ‘Strategic Plan 2007’ and ‘Strategic Plan 2012’. He was in-charge of the project on ‘Positioning BHEL for Accelerated Growth’ and also led the implementation of Pilot initiative for ‘Organizational Transformation through Integrated Operational Improvement Strategies in Bhopal and Hyderabad Units of BHEL’.

Earlier, Mr. Rao spearheaded the diversification initiative at BHEL’s Electronics Division, Bangalore, for the company’s entry into Defence Simulators. He was instrumental in setting up the 14th manufacturing unit of BHEL, Electronics Systems Division at Bangalore, in addition to Planning & Development activities.

Subsequently he joined the Heavy Power Equipment Plant at Hyderabad as In-charge of manufacturing of Steam Turbines, Gas Turbines and Compressors, during which period new machining methods using advanced tooling were introduced, improving the quality and reducing cycle time.

Mr. Rao represented India in the Study Group of World Energy Council on their initiative for developing ‘Energy Scenarios to 2050’. He has been a Member of the CII Capital Goods Committee and has been an active interface with Industry and Government bodies on various policy matters of concern to BHEL. He was also the company’s interface with the investment community for clarifying on the company’s position on various strategic matters within the guidelines of SEBI and Company Corporate Governance practices.