People

Australia: First Graphene has appointed Lester Lee as its Commercial Manager – Cement & Concrete. Singapore-based Lee holds nearly 30 years of experience working in the cement and concrete industries. This includes management roles in Hong Kong and Singapore with multinational companies such as Fosroc Construction Chemicals, K Wah Concrete Company and WR Grace.

First Graphene is an Australia-based supplier of graphitic materials and product formulations to sectors including cement and concrete, composites and plastics, coatings, adhesives, silicones and elastomers (CASE) and energy storage applications.

India: Sagar Cement has appointed KV Vishnu Raju as its chair. He succeeds K Thanu Pillai in the post.

Vishnu Raju is a graduate in Chemical Engineering from the National Institute of Technology in Tiruchirapalli and he holds a master's degree in Chemical Engineering from the Michigan Technological University in the US. He worked as an executive director and then managing director of Raasi Cements in the 1990s. He was later on the board of Anjani Portland Cement as its chair and managing director from 1999 to 2014.

Sagar Cement operates three integrated plants and two grinding plants in Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa and Pradesh Telangana.

Spain: LafargeHolcim España has appointed Carmen Díaz appointed as its director general. She succeeds Isidoro Miranda in the position and will report to Miljan Gutovic, Region Head EMEA at Holcim Group.

Díaz trained as a chemical engineer from the University of Oviedo and has taken the General Management Program (PDG) from the IESE Business School. She started working for Lafarge in 2002 as the head of its concrete business in Spain. She held the position of VP Commercial Performance in 2014 with responsibility for 30 countries. Later she became the Head of Ready-Mix Commercial and then the General Manager for the ReadySet Mix Digital Venture. Most recently she was worked as the Commercial Director of Spain for LafargeHolcim.

India: Ambuja Cements has appointed Gautam Adani as its chair and his son Karan Adani as a director. ACC has appointed Karan Adani as its chair. The changes in board personnel follow the completion of the acquisition of Holcim’s subsidiaries in India by Adani Group. Karan Adani is expected to manage both cement companies, according to the Press Trust of India.

Other initial personnel changes following the takeover include the appointment of Ajay Kapur as the chief executive officer (CEO) of Ambuja Cements. Vinod Bahety has been appointed as the chief financial officer. The company’s former chair, NS Sekhsari, has been appointment as chairman emeritus in recognition of his “outstanding and invaluable contributions.” At ACC, Sridhar Balakrishnan remains as CEO.

Gautam Adani, the chair and founder of Adani Group, holds over 30 years of business experience. Under his leadership, Adani Group has emerged as an integrated infrastructure conglomerate with interests in resources, logistics and energy sectors.

Karan Adani is the CEO of Adani Ports and SEZ Limited (APSEZ). He is currently leading the transformation at APSEZ to form an integrated logistics company. This has included growth at the company from two ports to 10 ports and terminals. He is an economics graduate from Purdue University in the US.

Ajay Kapur holds over 25 years of experience in the cement and construction, power and heavy metals sector. He joined Ambuja Cement in 1993 as an executive assistant to the then managing director (MD). He held various strategic positions over the last two decades, and from 2014 to 2019, he served as the CEO and managing director of the company. Prior to joining Adani Group in June 2022, Kapur was CEO - Aluminium and Power and MD - Commercial at Vedanta. Most recently he served as CEO of Special Projects at Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone. Kapur is an economics graduate from St Xavier's University in Mumbai and holds a Master’s of Business Administration (MBA) from the KJ Somaiya Institute of Management. He has also attended the Advanced Management Programme at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Vinod Bahety previously worked as the Group Head - Merger & Acquisition & Corporate Finance for Adani Group. He has worked on some of the major merger and acquisition activities for the group. Previously he worked in the banking sector. He is a chartered accountant by qualification.

Australia: Boral has announced that Vik Bansal will start work as its chief executive officer and managing director on 10 October 2022. It was previously announced that he would succeed Zlatko Todorcevski in early December 2022.