Akshar Chandra

About Akshar Chandra

Akshar is currently heading strategy and new businesses function at $10 Bn material sciences leader Avery Dennison, a fortune 500 company. Half of the role includes developing long term strategy, leading strategic projects including large scale business transformation exercises and new market development programs. Other half is a P&L role - developing and running new business lines (one operational). This also involves joint venture programs, technology development and building businesses from scratch.Prior to this, he was heading Strategic Initiatives at Birla Cellulose,$3 Bn MMCF industry leader & part of $70 Bn conglomerate \'Aditya Birla Group\'(ABG). Birla Cellulose has 12 mfg facilities (India, China, S.E. Asia, Canada, Europe) and sales/marketing in >120 countries. Aside from this, he has contributed to Healthcare industry, Govt. of India and has worked as a global Strategy & Ops Consultant in Business & Strategy Consulting, Market Assessment, Business Transformation, Due Diligence, Performance Improvement, Entry & Growth Strategy and Entrepreneurship.He has worked with a wide range of stakeholders including – leading private sector companies, state & central governments and development agencies, across geographies such as India, EU, UK, North America, China, South East Asia, Australia, Africa and others. He has actively engaged in business development activities and has been awarded with both ‘Best Employee’ award & ‘Super Team’ award for exceptional contribution to the respective organizations. At Fortis Healthcare, he underwent an extensive on-job training exercise which prepared him for handling P&L for a large facility with >500 employees & >US$ 100 Mn. annual revenue. At ABG, he built a culture of Sustainability, Innovation and Digitalization as key levers for value multiplication. He led high-ticket value creation efforts such as:1. Long term growth strategy - 2X revenues, 500 bp EBITDA margin increase, 2X specialty portfolio (from 24% to 50%), US$ 2.5 Bn. capex plan, from molecule selling to solution selling – in 7 years.2. Conceptualized, designed, developed and ran a pioneering \'Blockchain-enabled\' supply chain traceability platform ‘GreenTrack’.3. Cost reduction of $150 Mn across sourcing, manufacturing operations, logistics, sales & marketing, power consumption, maintenance operations, amongst other areas.4. Sales & Operations Planning module based on Big Data Analytics.5. Sustainability-enhanced brand grown 15X in 2020 – incremental value of $40 Mn with a premium of $3.2 Mn7. Digital Factory for 2 fibre manufacturing plants

Experience

1. Director Global, Strategy & New Business Incubation

   Avery Dennison

   Nov 2024 — Present

   As a head of 2 distinct functions, I lead the following workstreams:1) P&L role - New businesses (Global)a) Incubating new \'high value, high margin\' business lines - one operational with patented technology,>52% profit margin, global market TAM of >$900Mn and immediate SAM of $120Mnb) Managing joint venture programs and other external partnerships to develop innovative products and services.c) Product development; Product qualifications; Procurement processes, Setting up manufacturing; Market development, Building team; Setting up supply chain; etc.d) Working closely with global R&D and Venture teams to identify new technology/business opportunitiese) Continuous market assessments for identified opportunities2) Strategy role (Asia, Middle East and Africa)a) Long term Strategic Planning for Asia, Middle East and Africa - product mix, industry mapping, market share positions, pricing, sources of growth, key strategic initiatives, etc.b) Annual Operational Planning c) Largescale business transformation exercises - India operating model transformation with focus on commercial excellence, product & marketing, procurement, branding, customer experience, change management and creating multi million dollar EBIT unlock; South East Asia operating model transformation with a focus on productivity & efficiency, brand and retail connect, commercial excellence, procurement and product mix.d) Research and analysis on strategic topics

Education

• Hochschule Pforzheim

  MBA

• Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad

  PGDM

• National Institute of Technology Warangal

  B.Tech.

• Mahanagar Boys' Inter College

  Intermediate

Skills

• Business Intelligence
• Business Development
• Strategy
• New Business Development
• Due Diligence
• Operational Strategy
• Management
• Business Analysis
• Finance
• Business Solutions
• Business Planning
• Private Equity
• Corporate Strategy & Planning
• Corporate Finance
• Strategic Consulting
• Management Consulting
• Investment Banking
• Business Strategy
• Mergers & Acquisitions
• Financial Modeling
• Restructuring
• Negotiation
• Market Assessment