Outsourcing veteran Elesh Khakar joins Alsbridge in UK

Outsourcing advisor Alsbridge has boosted its UK team with Elesh Khakar, adding over 30 years of experience in sourcing and business IT management to its leadership. Khakar joins as a Managing Director in the UK office, based in Oxford.

With over 300 consultants on four continents, Alsbridge is one of the larger specialised consultancies in the sourcing domain. The firm supports clients with a range of management and IT consulting services, including benchmarking, outsourcing, IT asset management, vendor management and since recently, also robotics process automation (RAP).

Earlier this year Alsbridge – which is headquartered in Texas, US – unveiled ambitious growth plans in Europe, and in particular the UK, where it aims at growing its employee base to 50 by the end of this year, up from 15 at the start of 2015. As part of the expansion drive, Alsbridge UK in April acquired Source, an Oxford-based sourcing consultancy, and added several senior advisors to its local team, among others Paul Donaldson, who joined in September and has been tasked with developing the firm’s footprint in the growing robotics market segment. 

The latest high profile professional to join the ranks is Elesh Khakhar, an outsourcing and IT veteran with over 30 years’ experience in various leadership roles including strategic sourcing, IT Strategy, business transformation and IT consulting. Before joining Alsbridge, Khakhar was Director of Strategic Business Accounts for Hewlett-Packard, focusing on the energy sector and major accounts. Previously, he was at ISG (formerly TPI*) as a Partner, EMEA CIO Services and Strategic Deals. Khakhar also has significant experience in the financial services sector; his past roles include Head of Infrastructure for Halifax Group Treasury and Wholesale Banking and VP of Technology for J.P. Morgan. He spent the first twenty or so years of his career with IT firms Comshare and Sun Microsystems, and later on with J.P. Morgan and CSC. 

At Alsbridge, Khakhar joins the firm’s global Leadership team, reporting to the six-member Executive Team, which besides the latest joiner also consists of UK-based Eleanor Winn (who co-founded Source and joined following the acquisition), Barry Matthews and Steve Jeffree, as well as Jeff Frazer (Canada) and Olaf Baunack (Germany).

Chip Wagner, CEO of Alsbridge, says he is delighted with the appointment of Khakhar, stating “Elesh Khakhar brings a new level of depth and breadth of experience and expertise to our UK and European operations.” Wagner adds: “His demonstrated success in planning, negotiating and implementing large-scale, multi-billion dollar IT sourcing and business transformation programs in the EMEA market significantly enhances our ability to help clients address their business challenges and achieve positive outcomes.”

Commenting on his new role, Khakhar says: “This is an exciting time for our industry, and the need for effective collaboration, creativity and leadership to achieve success and deliver business results has never been greater. I look forward to working with our clients and my new colleagues to apply my experience and to continue to learn and be effective in today’s dynamic marketplace.”

Earlier this year Alsbridge was named of the World’s Best Outsourcing Advisors by the IAOP. 

* TPI was purchased by IT services giant ISG in April 2007 for $280 million.