Abhijit Lahiri (Abhi) is a results-oriented CFO who has a proven track record over the last 25 years working with leading multi-national corporations such as Tata and PepsiCo, maximizing top and bottom lines in tight margin environments by elevating people, processes and organisational thinking to new levels. He believes that Fractional CFOs can act as the NORTH STAR, helping the business understand the financial landscape, set clear financial goals and develop a roadmap for the same. He is also passionate about spreading financial literacy through Social Media platform such as LinkedIn and YouTube.
Abhi has worked at companies in India, China and Canada and across the different phases of a business’ life cycle, starting from formation, early stages of a start up, mature businesses as well as de-merger / exit / integration. He brings in a big picture understanding and appreciation of the business, having been involved in allied functions such as Supply Chain, Human Resources / Admin, IT, Internal Audit and Legal at different points of his career.
Most recently, Abhi was heading Finance and Supply Chain for Tata Consumer Products Canada (which is a part of USD 300 Bn Tata Group), where he has successfully helped transform the Business by improving topline / bottom line / cashflow by 60%/100%/200% respectively in the last 5 years. During his tenure, he led transformational projects such as: the upgrade to SAP S/4 HANA; the roll out of Business Intelligence Reporting through Prophix; the outsourcing of the Finance function (including AR, AP and Reporting) to Shared Service Centre; the integration of new companies that were acquired; supporting the Commercial Team in the successful launch of new products; and supply chain optimisation projects such as Vendor Managed Inventory which helped reduce the inventory from 110 days to 50 days etc.
Prior to that, he was the CFO for Nourishco Beverages (a 50-50 Joint Venture between Tata and PepsiCo), which disrupted the affordable hydration category in India by launching fortified water for the masses. Abhi was heading Finance, IT and Legal functions of the Company and was instrumental in setting up processes for the start up business, including a scalable / sustainable business model, funding plan, Board Governance, Financial Reporting structure, IT Systems as the business scaled.
In the past, Abhi has set up factories / companies in China from scratch through various stages, including setting up a factory in record time and within budget; playing an instrumental role in funding company at the most optimum cost and covering all Forex exposures to minimize losses; and securing land subsidy and income tax waiver for 4 years. He also handled the demerger of North Indian Plantations (part of Tata Tea) into a separate Company having a valuation of USD 100 Mn, including dealing with potential investors, business valuation, financial modelling and hand-holding of new management.
Abhi is a Gold Medallist in B.Com (Hons) from University of Calcutta (India), Chartered Accountant from India (All India 2nd / 3rd Rank in its various stages) and did his Canadian CPA 22 years after his Indian CA. He has been a speaker at various CFO Forums across India, China, Hong Kong, Canada, and mentor to Incubator Forums for Start Up companies in Canada and likes to mentor Indian Chartered Accountants who wants to pursue Canadian CPA.
