Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has appointed Bhawna Agarwal as its new Senior Vice President and Managing Director for India. With more than 25 years of experience leading tech start-ups and media ventures, Agarwal steps into this role at a pivotal moment as HPE ramps up its hybrid cloud and AI initiatives in the region.
Bhawana Agarwal becomes the new Senior Vice President and Managing Director of HPE in India. She succeeds Som Satsangi, who retires after more than 27 years of dedicated service with HPE. Som will remain with HPE through the end of July 2025 to ensure a smooth and seamless transition.
Bhawna is a Digital leader & an entrepreneur with 25+ years experience in leading media houses, Internet companies & start-ups in India. She was recognized as Asia’s Greatest CEO in 2017 by AsiaOne Magazine.
She joined HPE in 2019, to lead the Compute Business Unit and Growth team, and has been leading Account Management and Industry Verticals for India for one year. She is an experienced business leader with more than 25 years of diverse executive leadership experience with digital start-ups, media houses, and very large consumer tech companies.
Bhawna and Som recently celebrated the ribbon cutting of HPE’s 6001st ‘Made in India’ server with the Indian IT minister, Ashwini Vaishnaw, as part of HPE’s ‘Make in India’ plan.
Agarwal, a highly regarded digital leader and entrepreneur with more than 25 years of experience, has made a significant mark in the development of India’s internet and digital economy. She was named Asia’s Greatest CEO for 2017 by AsiaOne Magazine.
She started her career at the crossroad between fashion and pharma, and made a shift to the digital world in 2000. She began consulting clients on e-commerce solutions, and over time, advanced her career to join the founding team at Times Internet. In 2004, she was instrumental in launching Indiatimes Travel, India’s first online travel platform that would turn into a $5 billion digital travel market.
In 2006, she joined the founding team at Yatra.com, where she was responsible for P&L and successfully ran all functions for product, sales and marketing, alliances, and technology. Furthermore, she was an integral part of scaling the business from start-up to an important player in the travel tech space.
After two years leading teams at Seventymm, Agarwal led the e-commerce turnaround at that company starting in 2010, then made a transition in 2015 to become CEO of NDTV Gadgets. There she changed the brand into India’s No. 1 digital tech and gadgets platform and Top 15 globally.
Before taking over as MD, Agarwal was leading Growth and Transformation at HPE India, focusing on strategic initiatives to accelerate growth, including potential acquisitions.
Her appointment comes at a time when HPE is doubling down on its hybrid cloud and AI infrastructure strategy in India, a key growth market for the company.
About The Author
