Dell hired Thrikutam the same day he quit Infosys

Prasad Thrikutam, who was in charge of strategic sales, marketing and alliances at Infosys, will join Dell Services as president and global head of its Application Services division from July 28.

He takes over from Ashutosh Vaidya, who will move into a full-time position as head of Global Delivery for Dell Services.

Thrikutam, a 22-year industry veteran, will lead a global team of nearly 10,000 employees responsible for driving Dell's application services business across all vertical market segments, Dell said in a statement.

He will report to Dell Services President Suresh Vaswani and will be based at its headquarters in Plano, it added.

"Over the last few years, we have built an application services powerhouse. We continue to invest in innovative capabilities that resonate with the top priorities of our customers -- developing next generation applications to leverage digital technologies, legacy modernisation and SaaS-based services," Vaswani said.

Prasad's strategic expertise and experience in driving industry-leading growth and margins across multiple verticals globally will help Dell continue to grow and help customers as they transform their business, he added.

Thrikutam, whose exit from Infosys was announced on Thursday, has quit the country's second largest software services firm after 19 years across multiple executive leadership roles.

He was head of Infosys Americas and the global head for the $1.4 billion energy, utilities, telecom and services business unit.

He was also a senior member of the Infosys Executive Council and has served on the boards of Infosys BPO, Infosys China and Infosys Public Services as well as global head for strategic sales, marketing and alliances.

"This is an important time for Dell as well as for the IT services industry.

"Our Application Services business that Prasad will lead presents a great opportunity for Dell as we help our customers modernise and take advantage of digital transformation opportunities," Chairman and CEO Michael Dell said.

He added that Prasad's addition to Dell's leadership is another example of the investments the company is making in growing the Services business.

"Dell's strategy of providing end-to-end solutions that combines its technology strengths, entrepreneurial spirit, deep industry expertise and client centricity is a powerful mix.

"I am excited about being part of this journey and working with Dell's talented team to help drive its strategy," Thrikutam said.

Prior to joining Infosys, Thrikutam headed regional operations at a leading Indian IT company and before that he was at Bosch GmbH, India, where he held leadership roles in Manufacturing and Operations.

In September last year, Dell stockholders approved the proposal in which Michael Dell, Dell's Founder, Chairman and CEO, acquired Dell in partnership with global technology investment firm Silver Lake Partners.

The merger transaction closed on October 29, 2013, and the firm's common shares were subsequently delisted from the NASDAQ stock market.

As per the company's last filing to the exchanges, Dell Services accounted for $2.13 billion (over 14 per cent of the company's total revenues of $14.5 billion) for the quarter ended August 2, 2013.

Image: Prasad Thrikutam