Accenture names Rajendra Prasad as chief information and asset engineering officer

Professional services company, Accenture on Monday announced that it has appointed technology veteran Rajendra Prasad as the company’s chief information and asset engineering officer, effective July 1. This is a new CXO role that oversees all internal technology development and support for Accenture systems and Accenture assets for clients, the company said. He will succeed Penelope Prett as Accenture’s CIO and will report to Manish Sharma, Accenture’s chief operating officer.

Prasad’s appointment comes only two months after Accenture announced some key appointments in its leadership team. 

On 5 May, the company announced that Rekha M. Menon, Senior Managing Director and Chairperson for Accenture in India, is retiring after 29-years at the company, Accenture has appointed Ajay Vij as the Country Managing Director, and Sandeep Dutta will take over as the lead for Accenture's India Market Unit. 

“These leadership changes are integral to our strategic growth ambitions as we continue to push the boundaries of innovation and foster deeper collaboration with our partners to deliver even greater value to our clients,” said Sharma.

“With Rajendra’s appointment, we continue to pioneer both internal technology and asset engineering to drive new performance frontiers for Accenture and our clients,” he added. 

Prasad has more than 28 years of industry experience.

Meanwhile, Prett succeeds Gloria Samuels in the role of global lead for Accenture’s Workday Business Group and will report to Emma McGuigan. Samuels will retire on August 14 after a longstanding career at Accenture during which time she was instrumental in driving Accenture’s partnership with Workday and elevating it to new heights, the company said.

Prasad was earlier leading the global automation and intelligent assets for Accenture. Prior to that, he led Quality and Process Excellence for Technology Delivery Centers in India, and established the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) and People CMM process across the organisation. He also has a brief stint at Indian IT services firm Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).

Within the industry, he has played various leadership roles across geographies at several Fortune 500 companies, providing clients delivery excellence, project management and strategic process improvement. 

An M.Tech in design engineering from the National Institute of Technology Warangal, Prasad has 43 approved patents to his credit and over 150 patents filed worldwide. He has also pursued a machine learning (ML) programme from Stanford University. In 2020, he was named the winner of the prestigious IEEE Computer Society and Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute Humphrey Software Quality Award.