Micromax CEO Deepak Mehrotra quits, joins Pearson as India MD

Deepak Mehrotra has quit the country' top domestic handset maker Micromax to join publishing major Pearson as its managing director for India business, according to The Hindu Business Line.

Mehrotra had joined as CEO of Micromax in late December 2011 and spent less than two years at the helm of affairs. His appointment was seen as a move to professionalise the top management of the firm which was till then led by the founders themselves.

For the past two years, he was responsible for the product revamp, trade partnerships and overall business performance of the company. Prior to Micromax, Mehrotra had worked at Airtel as operations director (mobility business) and was with the company for eight years. Before that he worked at Coca Cola Beverages (as regional VP) and Asian paints.

Pearson Plc is a British media group that had earlier acquired Bangalore-based online tutoring firm Tutorvista. Prior to the 100 per cent acquisition, Pearson had invested a total of around $139 million in Tutorvista. In another deal, Pearson had acquired Educomp Solutions Ltd's 50 per cent stake in IndiaCan, a vocational training company formed as a joint venture between the two companies.

For Micromax, this piles up problems. Early this year, the handset maker was sued by telecom network equipment maker Ericsson over alleged patent infringement and refusal to enter into licence agreement related to wireless technology standards such as GSM, EDGE and 3G.

More recently, CBI named Rajesh Agarwal, co-founder of Micromax and Manish Tuli, a senior executive of the company, in a chargesheet over alleged case related to bribery of several government officials.

Gurgaon-based Micromax Informatics Ltd manufactures phones, data cards, funbooks and consumer electronics. The firm is backed by investors like Sequoia Capital, Madison India Capital, Sandstone Capital and TA Associates. Last year, Chinese fabless semiconductor firm Spreadtrum Communications Inc. also invested $10 million in the company.