Bharat Electronics on the basis of a letter from the Ministry of Defense, Government of India has appointed K V Suresh Kumar as Additional Director with effect from June 16, the company announced through an exchange filing.
Kaipa Venkata Suresh Kumar has been appointed as Director – Marketing of Bharat Electronics Limited on 16th June 2023. Suresh Kumar is a post-graduate in Electronics & Communications engineering and joined Bharat Electronics Limited in May 1989 as a Probationary Engineer. He has worked at multiple Units of BEL and in multiple technologies, held corporate positions and was the General Manager of Product Development and Innovation Center at Bangalore before his elevation to Director (Marketing). He is also the current Chief Indigenization Officer of BEL.
Throughout a career of 34 years, he has been an accomplished engineer with rich experience in diverse technology areas dealing with all major customer segments and has been deeply involved in driving business development through R&D. He is a recipient of Raksha Mantri’s Excellence Award. Under his tutelage, many patents / copy rights were created by his teams.
He has worked in all phases of product development life-cycle including conceptualization, design, development, qualification, installation & commissioning, field trials and induction of the systems. He has full understanding and knowledge of the end user’s needs/requirements and the means to meet them.
In his role as GM - PDIC, he has been guiding a team of 500 engineers for in-house development of technology modules in 16 verticals, which are used across BEL. He is also driving the IP generation and skill enhancement there. Prior to this, he held the position of General Manager -Technology Planning / Corporate Office, where he spearheaded planning and execution of all the R&D activities across the company, which resulted in a large number of R&D projects that have since been successfully commercialized.
From 2017 to 2019, his efforts and contributions have resulted in induction of highly complex and state-of-art airborne EW Systems onto the fighter aircrafts of IAF leading to receipt of orders worth Rs. 3,000 Cr. He was instrumental in realizing a 100 Mn USD export order from Airbus for supply of EW Suite, which is the single largest export order received by BEL. He also introduced new products and created new / future business opportunities worth about Rs. 4,000 Cr.
Between 2014 and 2017, he has successfully led teams for development and induction of a larger number of Electro-Optic products / systems into Indian Army and Paramilitary Forces that have fetched a business of about Rs. 5,000 Cr. He had also aggressively pursued indigenization efforts and saved about Rs. 300 Cr FE.
Prior to 2014, he had developed and inducted many EW systems into the helicopters and aircraft of Indian Navy and IAF. During the same period, his efforts have resulted in receipt of about Rs. 1,000 Cr order from IAF on nomination basis for setting up the world’s most comprehensive EW Test Range in India.
Since 2021, he has been serving as Chief Indigenization Officer of BEL and has made significant contributions to the Atma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan. BEL has saved more than Rs. 1,000 Cr FE in the last two years through indigenization efforts. BEL has also contributed more than 100 products to the Positive Indigenization Lists promulgated by MoD. Majority of these products are under development through industry under Make II route.
