Bharti Airtel Names Shashwat Sharma As MD & CEO; Soumen Ray Gets Group CFO Charge

Bharti Airtel Ltd announced on Thursday that Shashwat Sharma would succeed Gopal Vittal as managing director and chief executive officer of the company from Jan 1.

Vittal will move into the role of executive VC of Bharti Airtel from the same date. The company has also appointed Akhil Garg as Bharti Airtel India chief financial officer, according to an exchange filing.

The telecom major also confirmed the appointment of Soumen Ray as the group chief financial officer.

Shashwat Sharma, who is presently the chief operations officer at Bharti Airtel Ltd., will be appointed the managing director and chief executive officer of the company on Jan. 1, 2026.

The company had appointed Sharma as the CEO-designate in October last year in preparation for this role. As the CEO designate, Sharma had been responsible for the entire end-to-end consumer business. Gopal Vittal had also in October started mentoring and grooming Sharma for the take-over.

Vittal has led Airtel as the MD and CEO for over a decade, and in this period, the company has built a portfolio of businesses across mobile, B2B, home broadband, DTH and digital services. In the mobile space, Airtel has seen its revenue share grow from 30% to 40% under Vittal's leadership.

As a part of Vittal's new role, he will take on broader telecom responsibilities across the group, according to the company's earlier release. As a Bharti nominee director, Vittal will join the board of Airtel Africa Plc to offer strategic guidance.

In addition, he will be responsible for driving group synergies in select areas, such as network strategy, digital and technology, procurement and talent.

Shares of Bharti Airtel closed 0.81% lower at Rs 2,092 apiece on the NSE, compared to a 0.01% slip in the Nifty 50 at close on Thursday.