Krishna Tanuku

Dr Krishna Tanuku has taken over the mantle of the Executive Director, Wadhawani Centre for Entrepreneurship Development (WCED), from July 2008. After spending several years at the helm of various multinational companies, Dr Tanuku first began his association with the Indian School of Business three years ago. His role at ISB has been as an Executive Advisor and Mentor. His contributions within the ISB have facilitated the alignment of the CoEs strategy, social responsibility initiatives, and operational plans within the overall ISB strategy.

Dr Tanuku has had an illustrious career that spans over 25 years of global experience covering the US, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. His expertise covers multiple levels and aspects of global business creation and execution – from R&D to the creation of JVs and executive business management.

Starting his career at Bell Labs in 1978, his first significant achievement was designing and implementing a distributed computing environment to support large-scale software development. In 1985, Dr Tanuku undertook a major initiative in globalization by establishing the first customer support center in China and an offshore development center in Bombay. Then in 1989, he set up AT&T in India and played a key role in shaping both the telecom industry as well as offshore software development in India. During his tenure, Dr Tanuku also helped found the American Chamber of Commerce in India, an organization which represents US business interests. He was re-elected by peers for five consecutive years as Executive Committee Member and co-Chairman. He also established AT&T Global Information Systems (now NCR) in India and set up multiple offshore development centers.

In 1994, Dr Tanuku was recognized with an international award by the Wisitex Foundation as "MAN of the YEAR 1994 - Management and Business Vision" for "Business Acumen, Innovative Ideas, Services and Leadership in the field of Telecommunication and Informatics". This Award was conferred for his untiring efforts in globalization of technologies. He then returned to the US as Global Operations Director to AT&T on-line services. Retaining his fervor for the globalization of R&D, Dr Tanuku once again took on the challenge to enhance the Bell Labs R&D footprint across the globe and set up the India R&D Program for Lucent's wireless business in 1997. As the Managing Director of Bell Labs, India he was responsible for R&D centers in Bangalore, Hyderabad and Egypt, as well as satellite centers in Ireland, UK and Germany.

His current passion is to help build next generation global enterprises based on innovative business and customer models of partnerships by leveraging capabilities and needs across multiple domains, segments and technologies that create sustainable and equitable business value. He is also a strong advocate of social equity and innovation for sustainable societies both in principle and spirit.

Dr Tanuku has received an MS in Computer Science and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley. He also has an MBA in Finance and International Business from the University of Chicago. He also received advanced executive management training from INSEAD, France.