Shailesh Chandra appointed CEO, MD of Tata Motors for three years, Dhiman Gupta as CFO

Homegrown carmaker Tata Motors announced on Friday that it has appointed Shailesh Chandra as the Managing Director and CEO of Tata Motors for a period of three years, effective October 1. Chandra will also join the company’s board as an additional director.

Tata Motors has also named Dhiman Gupta as the CFO and key management personnel of the company, effective November 17. Gupta will succeed PB Balaji, who will take over as the CEO of Jaguar Land Rover. Gupta is currently the CFO of Tata Passenger Electric Mobility, whereas Chandra is currently the managing director for Tata Motors Passenger Vehicles Limited and Tata Passenger Electric Mobility Limited.

Chandra will continue to serve as the Managing Director of Tata Passenger Electric Mobility Limited, the electric vehicle entity and a wholly owned subsidiary of Tata Motors. Girish Wagh, who leads the commercial vehicles arm of Tata Motors, will join the board of TML Commercial Vehicles as an additional director, managing director and CEO, effective October 1.

In March 2024, Tata Motors’ board approved a proposal to demerge the automaker into two separate listed companies—one housing its commercial vehicles business and the other its passenger vehicles business, including electric vehicles (EVs) and the British marque Jaguar Land Rover (JLR). The demerger will be implemented through a National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) scheme of arrangement, and all shareholders of Tata Motors will continue to hold the same shareholding in both the listed entities.

Over the past few years, the commercial vehicles (CV), passenger vehicles (PV+EV), and Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) businesses of Tata Motors have been operating independently under their respective CEOs. The demerger is a logical progression of the subsidiarisation of PV and EV businesses that was done earlier in 2022, the automaker said last year.

While there are limited synergies between CV and PV businesses, considerable synergies can be harnessed across PV, EV, and JLR, particularly in areas such as EVs, autonomous vehicles, and vehicle software.

PB Balaji will take over as CEO of Jaguar Land Rover at a time when the company is reportedly struggling to pay its suppliers after production has been halted for nearly a month following a cyberattack on September 1 that has since brought the storied luxury carmaker to its knees, with daily losses mounting between £5 million and £10 million.

The financial implications of the prolonged cybersecurity woes are expected to significantly dent the company’s second-quarter results, following a dismal first quarter, during which U.S. tariffs and reduced demand in key markets, including China and Europe, weighed on the results.

Jaguar Land Rover recorded a decline in wholesale and retail sales by 10.7% and 15.1% in the first quarter, and its pre-tax profit plunged 49% to £351 million in the three months ended June 30.