Arvind Rao, CEO and MD of OnMobile, a leading Data and Value Added Services (VAS) company has resigned. While the company looks for a new CEO, Mouli Raman, co-founder and Executive Director has been appointed as the interim Managing Director of the company.
The resignation comes after a review done by Amarchand Mangaldas & Suresh A. Shroff, Advocates and KPMG. The review lead to the identification of “weaknesses” in some processes related to corporate governance. Based on this review, the company has initiated steps to rectify all the weaknesses. There is no clarity with regards to these weaknesses and the concerned processes.
Arvind Rao’s resignations seems to be as a fall out of the review, since these “weaknesses” took place during his tenure. His resignation has been accepted by the board.
Arvind, has been one of the promoters of the company and has been widely acknowledged as a VAS pioneer. He is credited to have successfully lead the company to growth and a market leadership position. For some time now, there has been various rumors regarding possible financial misappropriation against him, which has been denied by OnMobile. Earlier it had been reported by Economic Times, that an investigation & probe by the company into suspected misappropriation and siphoning of funds is underway at OnMobile. The company had however maintained that the investigation through the appointment of an external agency has been set up to “review the internal control mechanisms as a part of an ongoing exercise to strengthen and improve corporate governance processes".
OnMobile, an Infosys incubated company, was founded in 2000, and has 1500 employees spread across India, U.S., LATAM, Africa, Australia, Middle East and Europe. The company was publicly listed in India in 2008. The company has grown organically, as well as through acquisitions. Some recent acquisitions of the company include Voxmobili (2007), Telisma (2008), and Dilithium Networks (2010).