Sanjay Patel to speak on ‘Global Best Practices in Finance Transformation’

The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA – Sri Lanka) and the Sri Lanka Association of Software and Service Companies (SLASSCOM) will conduct a best practice sharing forum of national importance addressing the opportunities and best practices relevant to finance business partners in light of global development in technology, data analytics and global business development strategies.

Sanjay Patel, Managing Director Global Business Services (GBS) in Rio Tinto, one of the world’s leading mining and exploration companies will share his insights on ‘Global Best Practices in Finance Transformation: The Rio Tinto story’. 

Sanjay is responsible for leading the global finance shared services, helping shape the finance organisation and leads the execution of finance services for Rio Tinto, with a primary focus on managing and implementing the new service model while delivering a breadth of high-quality finance services. 

His team is also responsible for driving the design of finance shared services end to end global processes and continuous improvement of end to end global finance process for on-going efficiency and effectiveness opportunities. In addition to his finance shared services responsibilities, he also leads the GBS COE for Data, Reporting and Analytics. 

He has operational responsibility for the finance shared services delivery centres in Asia Pacific, EMEA and North America including BPO delivery centres. 

Prior to joining Rio Tinto in November 2013, Sanjay spent 22 years with a global pharmaceutical company, Merck & Co. Inc., in various roles in finance, audit, compliance, IT and operations. He joined the shared services team in 2008 and led Merck’s multi-functional Regional Shared Services in EMEA and APAC. He had oversight for the delivery centres in the regions including managing the Global BPO relationship. Services offered included Order-to-Cash, Accounting-to-Reporting, Procure-to-Pay, Travel Expense Management, Master Data Management, Business Analytics, HR Shared Services, Travel/Card/Meetings and PtP Contact Centre services. 

Sanjay’s career spans the globe having worked in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Ireland and the US, where he held various leadership positions including country Finance Director, Commercial Director, Audit Director, Senior Director – Business Standards and Compliance and Senior Director – Financial Evaluation and Analysis. These opportunities provided Sanjay with a broad background of diverse experiences at the country, regional and corporate levels. 

Sanjay has a track record of building, motivating, developing and energising a high-performing team across a broad range of skill sets. 

Sanjay holds a CPA from the Australian Society of Certified Practicing Accountants, a CA from the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants and a bachelor’s degree in accounting from James Cook University in Australia. 

Sanjay is also a proud recipient of the 2012 Shared Services & Outsourcing Network’s ‘Individual Contribution to the Industry’ Award as well as leading his team in winning the awards for ‘2012 Excellence in Culture Creation award (SSON)’ and ‘2013 Excellence in Value Creation award (SSON)’.

The event will also feature Vinod Bidarkoppa, Director (Group IT) and Chief Information Officer, Tesco HSC, Bangalore, Rajaram Natarajan Global Delivery Lead – Healthcare, Concentrix, India as well as local experts from the Shared Services and Outsourcing sector. Dr. Arul Sivagananathan, Managing Director, Hayleys Industrial Solutions and Director HSBI, Chandima Cooray, Chief Process Officer, Hemas holdings PLC, Fadhil Jiffry, Chief Financial Officer, Millennium IT and Hariharan Padmanaban, Director, Business Development, H-Connect will share insights on how finance transformation and business model innovation will drive sustainable competitiveness in local industries bringing in the global context of their operations where relevant.

The event partners include some of the key players in their respective industries in Sri Lanka, with Orion City as the Platinum Sponsor, Millennium IT as the Strategic Partner, SAKS Global as the Gold Sponsor, HNB PLC as the official bank and IFS as the Technology Partner. LMD has come on board as the official business magazine and Daily FT is the exclusive print media partner for the event.

Contact [email protected] to register for the event.