The mediation process between Infosys’ founders and its board has begun. According to sources BusinessLine spoke to, Cyril Shroff, Managing Partner at law firm Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, is leading the discussions.
“The (law) firm will also be meeting key institutional investors of Infosys,” said a source. Another source added that an attempt is being made to settle all differences quickly, citing the appointment of Ravi Venkatesan as co-chairman in April — a move intended to patch things up with the founders over corporate governance-related issues.
An Infosys spokesperson said the company did not have any additional updates on this issue. An email sent to Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas remained unanswered.
In February, the company’s founders had a public spat with the board over issues related to corporate governance (regarding the Panaya acquisition), shareholder returns, the severance pay of former CFO Rajiv Bansal, and top-management compensation.
Reacting to this, the board brought in Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas to ascertain the views of various stakeholders.
However, at that time, Chairman R Seshasayee said that the firm had been brought in to design a roadmap for governance and not for any mediation. This included changes to the company’s articles of association, and removal of subjectivity and reworking of severance pay in contracts after the Bansal episode.
Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy had publicly voiced concerns, stating that since June 2015, there had been a drop in corporate governance standards.
This development also comes at a time when former CFO Rajiv Bansal has approached an arbitration tribunal for the remaining ₹12 crore of his severance pay, which was suspended after the co-founders questioned the payout.