Wal-Mart India names Murali Lanka as COO
Lanka will lead store operations, sales and business development and marketing and asset protection functions
New Delhi: The local arm of American supermarket chain Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has appointed Murali Lanka as chief operations officer (COO), effective 1 December, the company said in a statement on Friday. Lanka will head the company’s store operations, sales and business development, membership and marketing, and asset protection functions for the Best Price Modern Wholesale stores, a chain of 20 cash-and-carry stores owned and operated by Wal-Mart India. He will report to Krish Iyer, president and chief executive.
To be sure the chief operations officer position is a new one within the company.
The company is seeking to beef up its top management in the country months after it announced sizable investments to add 50 cash-and-carry stores in India over the next five years, seizing opportunities in a market where the newly formed government still remains opposed to the entry of larger foreign supermarket chains retailing directly to end-users.
The company is also shoring up its business-to-business e-commerce operations across multiple states in the country.
Lanka joined Wal-Mart in 1989 and has served in various roles at Sam’s Club, a wholesale format. In 2008, he came to India as the head of operations, and spent five years in the country before relocating to the US in 2013 as the developmental regional general manager in the Texas division of the company.
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