Pennar Group announced a leadership transition. As per the company, Nrupender Rao, Chairman has decided to step down from his position and R V S Ramakrishna has been appointed as the new independent chairman of the group. Nrupender Rao will now bear the title of chairman emeritus, the company stated.

Over the years, under Rao's leadership, Pennar Group has expanded from a commodity steel manufacturer to a multinational engineering company with presence in the Automotive, Hydraulics, Energy, Infrastructure and Engineering Services verticals. Notably, Ramakrishna has a professional journey in the engineering sector spanning more than four decades. An engineering graduate in Chemical Technology from Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS) Pilani; he started his career with Coromandel Fertilisers Limited, Visakhapatnam as a graduate engineer trainee.

Ramakrishna pursued PGDM from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad in 1982. Post completion, he joined ITW Signode India Ltd. as an area sales executive based in Jamshedpur. Owing to his engineering prowess and business acumen, he was inducted on the Board of ITW Signode in 1995 as a whole time director to head its Steel Business.

He went on to lead ITW Signode India Ltd. as its managing director from June 1999 and as group president- APAC and MEA regions comprising Signode India, China, MEA, Japan, Korea, and ASEAN in 2011. Ramakrishna retired from his executive roles on December 31, 2020. He held the position of the chairman of the Indian Institute of Packaging from 2016 to 2019 and was also an active member of CII (AP and Telangana).