ON A CRISP November afternoon in 2005, Warren Harris walked into the opulent Four Seasons Hotel George V in Paris to meet Ratan Tata for the first time. The French capital was slipping into winter — the air sharp, Christmas markets luring early buyers with their festive warmth. Harris, then head of engineering services firm INCAT — which had been taken over by Tata Technologies just three months ago — had spoken with Tata only over the phone. “We had a couple of conversations about the opportunity to converge INCAT with the Tata company,” Harris recalls.

Tata, meanwhile, was in Paris for Falcon jet training. His day had started early at Le Bourget, where he was on a flight simulator at 4 a.m. “When we met that afternoon, he was clearly tired, but he was extremely gracious. We exchanged pleasantries over coffee, and then he invited me for dinner,” says Harris.

That dinner stretched from 7 p.m. to well past midnight. It was more than a meal — it was an initiation into the world of Tata. Ratan Tata spoke with quiet conviction about his vision for Tata Technologies, about India’s future, and about the Tata group’s role in shaping the country’s industrial ambitions. “It felt like I had met the Pied Piper. All I wanted to do was drop everything and follow him,” Harris remembers. “He was such an inspiration.”

That evening cemented Harris’s commitment to Tata. Tata Technologies, a subsidiary of Tata Motors, had acquired INCAT International for £53.4 million. This significantly expanded Tata Technologies’ presence in automotive and aerospace engineering, adding global scale and capabilities. Two decades later, the British-born executive, now CEO & MD, is among the longest-serving expatriates in the salt-to-software conglomerate. Under his leadership, Tata Technologies went public in November 2023, reporting a profit of ₹624 crore on revenues of ₹4,414 crore in FY23. By FY25, the revenues rose to ₹5,168 crore with net profit of ₹677 crore. And by mid-August this year, the company commanded a market capitalisation of around ₹27,000 crore.

According to Harris, Tata’s vision for Tata Technologies was never to replicate TCS. He wanted it to become a showcase of India’s innovation and engineering strength, a platform for creating intellectual property and products with global impact. “He believed Indian engineers were resourceful,” says Harris, “and that they could create solutions that would succeed not only in India but across the world.”

Expatriate CEOs at India-based companies are rare, especially for extended periods, given the strong domestic talent pool and cultural alignment in leadership roles. Under Harris, Tata Technologies evolved from being an outsourced engineering arm of Tata Motors into a full-fledged engineering research and development company serving marquee clients across automotive, aerospace, industrial machinery, and new-age sectors such as electric vehicles (EVs) and semiconductors. In 2012, the company developed the eMO electric mobility concept and later played a key role in helping Tata Motors convert internal combustion engine models into EVs within short timeframes. Today, it serves global giants like Tesla, Airbus and Volvo Cars while maintaining deep ties with its parent group.

Tryst with Tata and India

Harris first came to India in April 2005, seeking the right partner for INCAT’s merger. Within days, he found what he was looking for in Tata Technologies. For Harris, who was then steering INCAT’s business across Europe and North America, the alignment felt natural. “We were talking the same language,” he says.

His visit was hosted by Pat McGoldrick, then MD & CEO of Tata Technologies. As Harris prepared to leave, McGoldrick handed him a coffee-table book on Tata and suggested he pick up Reimagining India by Arun Maira, then chairman of BCG India, with a foreword by Ratan Tata. At the airport, an immigration officer spotted the book and launched into a spirited half-hour account of what Tata meant to India, while a line of passengers waited behind. The encounter sowed in Harris a lasting passion for Tata.

Born and raised in North West England, just outside Liverpool, Harris — a mechanical engineer by training — began his career in London before moving to Detroit in the U.S. in 1988. In Detroit, he worked on developing software for IBM’s 3D CAD systems used by automakers and contributed to Chrysler’s product development process, now part of Stellantis. That exposure to the industry laid the foundation for his entrepreneurial journey. He helped build a company in the U.S., and when it was later sold to an over-leveraged public firm, Harris and nine investors bought back its division — INCAT — and kept it afloat. Once business regained momentum, INCAT merged with Tata Technologies, tying Harris’s professional destiny to India.

After the merger, Harris remained based in Detroit but travelled to India almost every month. “I’ve been coming here for many years until 2021. More recently, because of the IPO, I spent three years full-time here between Mumbai and Pune,” he says. His personal life, however, stayed tied to the U.S. His wife passed away in 2019, leaving him with four sons, all of whom visited India at some point. The Tata Technologies IPO in 2023 — the first from the Tata group in two decades — was a moment of immense pride. His parents, then 85 and 81, flew in from the U.K. to be part of it. “They stayed at the Taj Palace in Mumbai, raised a toast on the big day, and even attended the bell-ringing ceremony. It was their first time in India,” Harris recalls with emotion.

Despite his deep connection with India, Harris’s roots remain firmly in Liverpool and his boyhood soccer club, Everton. He remembers being taken to games as a four-year-old by his father. “Soccer is somewhat of a religion in North West England, especially in Liverpool. As one coach once said, ‘It’s not a question of life or death. It’s far more important than that,’” he says. This May, Harris gave something back to his father by securing tickets to Everton’s final game at Goodison Park, the club’s home for 133 years. “It was emotional for both of us. I’ve been going there since I was a kid.”

The enticing ecosystem

In the formative years of Tata Technologies, Ratan Tata wasn’t just a guiding presence — he was hands-on in shaping the company’s future. Harris vividly recalls a defining moment in 2009. After a board meeting at Bombay House, Tata invited him to his fourth-floor office. On a whiteboard, Tata sketched a compact electric pod car with four hub motors, a top speed of 65 mph, and a range of more than 100 miles. He set the challenge: build it for $20,000.

At the time, battery costs alone hovered around $13,000. But Harris and his team embraced the challenge, reimagining not just the vehicle but the entire manufacturing process. In 2012, the vehicle was unveiled at the North American International Automotive Show in Detroit, where Elon Musk had revealed the Tesla Model S in 2010.

Harris’s journey through the Tata group was shaped by interactions with stalwarts such as Jamshed J. Irani, S. Ramadorai, R. Gopalakrishnan, Ravi Kant, and Praveen Kadle. “What struck me was their humility,” Harris says. “They were candid, committed, and deeply principled.”

He recalls meeting N. Chandrasekaran in 2006 at a TCS delivery centre in Mumbai. Over tea, Harris asked when he found time for family. Chandra replied that he planned a week each year but had only managed two days in one year. That dedication left a lasting impression.

Ramadorai’s discipline also inspired Harris. “He started his day at 5 a.m. and took TCS from $400 million in 1996 to $9 billion by retirement,” Harris notes. Tata himself introduced Harris to Irani, who later helped him navigate the Technology Business Management framework. “He couldn’t have been more helpful,” Harris recalls.

In Novi, Michigan, Harris once hosted Irani at a company event. Irani addressed the North American employees, passionately urging them to care more for their parents — something he felt Indian families did better. “Only Irani could get away with that,” Harris laughs.

Harris admires the Tata group’s understated courage. “Launching a battery company when so many have failed, or taking on Air India after decades of underinvestment,” he says. According to him, Tata drives on purpose. When Chandrasekaran took over in 2017, speculation swirled about Tata Motors selling its passenger vehicles business. But Chandra’s response was clear: “We don’t sell businesses, we run businesses.”

In 2009, Harris proposed merging Tata Technologies and INCAT for better synergy. Tata agreed, but was moved when Harris volunteered to drop the INCAT brand. “He asked if I was sure. He was touched,” Harris recalls. That same year, Chrysler — Tata Technologies’ biggest U.S. client — went bankrupt. With 350 employees on-site, the board stood by Harris, supporting both staff and customers.

That long-term vision is embedded in Tata’s DNA. “The investments being made today aren’t just for tomorrow — they’re for the next decade,” Harris says. He’s seen the transformation first-hand, especially at Jaguar Land Rover. “The mindset shift since joining Tata is remarkable.”

When Harris, then COO, was asked to become CEO in 2014, he was deeply honoured. “As a non-Indian, I was flattered. The board’s endorsement — including Ramadorai, Gopalakrishnan, Ramakrishnan, Kadle, and McGoldrick — meant everything,” he says.

For Harris, two decades with Tata have not felt long, only defining.