Bhawna Agarwal succeeds Som Satsangi as HPE India SVP and MD

U.S.-based tech major Hewlett-Packard Enterprise (HPE) announced the appointment of Bhawna Agarwal as Senior Vice President and Managing Director for HPE India, reporting to Executive Vice President and Chief Sales Officer Heiko Meyer, effective immediately. Agarwal succeeds Som Satsangi, who is retiring after over 27 years with HPE (formerly Compaq), but will remain until the end of July 2025 to ensure a smooth transition.

Satsangi, who joined Compaq in 1997 and rose through sales leadership roles after HP acquired Compaq in 2002, became Managing Director of HPE India in 2016. He led HPE's second-largest employee base to significant achievements. Agarwal, who joined HPE in 2019 and most recently led Account Management and Industry Verticals for India, brings over 25 years of leadership experience from digital start-ups, media, and consumer tech. Recently, she and Satsangi celebrated the inauguration of HPE’s 6001st ‘Made in India’ server with the Indian IT Minister, Ashwini Vaishnaw.

“I have come to know Som as a driven, thoughtful, and customer-centric leader, who is an expert counselor and sales executive,” said Executive Vice President and Chief Sales Officer, Heiko Meyer. “We will miss Som's leadership in the Global Sales organisation, but we are in the capable hands of Bhawna, who comes with a growth mindset and customer-centric thinking and leads with intention, agility, and purpose.”  

Agarwal previously served as CEO at NDTV Gadgets360 and held board and advisory roles at Max Life Limited, Venture Fund, and OYO Rooms, among others. She holds an MBA from the Institute of Management Technology and completed a Senior Executive Leadership Program at Harvard Business School.
She said in a LinkedIn post: “Sometimes, life presents you with an opportunity to write a new chapter, and you realize it's time to start a whole new book. Becoming the Managing Director of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) India is one of those transformative moments for me. Together with our committed and agile team, we will strive to achieve new milestones and deliver exceptional value to our customers & partners.”

“I look forward to building on the strong foundation laid by Som and continuing to drive growth, scaling our impact and innovation in the region. Together with our talented team, we will strive to achieve new milestones, shaping a future reflective of our ambitions and delivering exceptional value to our customers and partners," she added.

HPE is experiencing significant market growth in India, particularly in areas like cloud computing, AI, and big data. In an earlier interview with Mint/TechCircle (published December 2023) CEO Antonio Neri said that this growth is driven by factors such as the expansion of cloud computing services, increased adoption of AI and big data technologies, government initiatives, and data localization policies. HPE's "Make in India" initiative, focused on manufacturing servers locally, further strengthens its position in the Indian market. 

In April, HPE launched its HPE Private Cloud AI solution in India, designed to help enterprises rapidly deploy generative and agentic AI applications at scale. The integrated platform combines NVIDIA's AI computing, networking, and software with HPE's AI storage, compute, and GreenLake cloud services.