Pratap Bose joins Mahindra Group as Chief Design Officer 

It’s official. Pratap Bose has joined the Mahindra Group. The automaker has appointed Bose as the Executive Vice-President and Chief Design Officer to lead its newly formed Global Design organisation.

He will operate out of the UK where the company will soon have its new Mahindra Advanced Design Centre (MADE) up and ready next month. Autocar India had, on May 6, first reported on Bose being all set to join M&M.

The Global Design organisation will comprise of MADE, which is being set up in Coventry in the West Midlands, U.K and the existing Mahindra India Design Studio (M.I.D.S). The Global Design Organisation will harness the world-class talent pool and expand its global technology footprint.

In this role, Bose will be responsible for both M.A.D.E and M.I.D.S and will oversee design of all key business segments such as authentic SUVs including Born Electric Vehicle (BEV), LCV products (under <3.5 T), Last Mile Mobility (LMM), Large CVs, Peugeot Scooters (France) and Tractors & Farm Machines. Pratap will join on June 24, 2021 and will report to Rajesh Jejurikar, Executive Director, Auto and Farm Sectors, M&M.

Pratap, who is an alumnus of Royal College of Art, London and National Institute of Design, India, has over 20 years of rich global automotive design experience. His last assignment was with Tata Motors in the UK where he was Vice-President of Global Design and played a big role in contributing to a makeover for its passenger cars and SUVs. His competencies will come in handy at M&M which is also rebooting its priorities under a new leadership team. Bose had earlier worked in Piaggio, Italy and Daimler Chrysler, Japan.

Speaking about the announcement, Rajesh Jejurikar, Executive Director, Auto and Farm Sectors, Mahindra & Mahindra, said, “We are at an inflection point in our Auto and Farm Sectors growth journey as we accelerate our transformative initiatives. Our robust pipeline of 23 new products that will be launched in the next five years would bring our design and advanced engineering capability across automotive, farm equipment and two wheelers to the fore. Having Pratap on the team will strengthen our design capability, enhance our products and widen our customer base. We are very excited to welcome him on board and look forward to writing a new chapter in Mahindra’s rich product legacy.”

Ramkripa Ananthan puts in her papers
Meanwhile, in another development, it is learnt from an internal company memo that Ramkripa Ananthan, M&M’s Head of Design, has called it a day at the automaker after a stint of nearly 24 years. She was part of key projects like the Scorpio, XUV500, XUV300 and the Marazzo.  

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