Madras University graduate appointed VP, CIO of storied American paint company

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The paint company PPG (NYSE:PPG) recently announced the appointment of Bhaskar Ramachandran as vice president and chief information officer (CIO). Ramachandran will succeed Chris Caruso, current vice president, IT, who has announced his intent to retire, effective March 1, 2021, a press release from the company said.

Ramachandran earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Madras University in Chennai, followed by an advanced diploma in information systems from the National Institute of IT in India, and a master’s in business administration degree from Duke University’s The Fuqua School of Business.

Immediately prior to PPG, Ramachandran was in Jabil Inc., an American worldwide manufacturing services company. As vice president, IT, and CIO of the company’s largest division, he is credited with creating a transformative strategy to introduce a fully cloud-based connected eco-system to make production more efficient and cost-effective.

Before joining Jabil in 2015, Ramachandran worked at Textrone, Inc., a multi-industry company, where he was accountable for strategy development and operational elements of Textron’s SAP center of excellence (COE).

Progressing through leadership roles at Textron, Ramachandran was appointed VP, IT, and CIO for the company’s defense and intelligence segment in 2013.

Ramachandran also previously worked for Sybase, Inc., an enterprise software and services company; Prudential Financial, Inc., an investment and insurance company; and IBM / PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) consulting company, where he led the application infrastructure team that supported implementation of SAP for numerous pharma, retail and manufacturing clients.

The company Ramachandran is going to start at March 1, develops paints, coatings and specialty materials for more than 135 years.

With headquarters in Pittsburgh, PPG operates in more than 70 countries and reported net sales of $15.1 billion in 2019, the press release said. It serves customers in construction, consumer products, industrial and transportation markets and aftermarkets.