Executive Search for India's New Industrial Economy
Typical mandate snapshot
Capacity is being built faster than the leadership to run it
India is building industrial capacity across several sectors at the same time, and the scale is not incremental. 2030 targets set out a fivefold expansion of the space economy, roughly US$20 billion committed to semiconductors, data centre capacity growing fivefold to 10GW, and close to 90 percent of the solar value chain localised.
Capital and policy are the easier part of that story. The constraint is people.
01
The pool is small and everyone knows it.
The obvious twenty candidates have usually been approached already, often badly.
01
The pool is small and everyone knows it.
The obvious twenty candidates have usually been approached already, often badly.
02
Scale-up experience is scarcer than domain experience.
Few have taken an operation from commissioning to rate production.
03
Compensation benchmarks are unreliable.
Published salary data lags reality in sectors this new.
04
Institutional transitions are common and fragile.
The adjustment to private pace is where these hires most often fail.
05
Timelines are tied to something physical.
A commissioning date does not move because a search is running late.
Three things that decide whether an industrial search closes
01
02
03
Sectors we search in
Manufacturing & Automotive
Deepest pool. The hire is about running a transition.
Semiconductors
No domestic pool at commercial fab scale.
Data centers
Fastest growth, least developed leadership pool
Electronics & EMS
Assembly to components changes the profile
Solar & Renewables
Upstream segments are genuinely new here.
Aerospace & Defence
Qualification, traceability, programme discipline.
Space Tech
Smallest pool. Rate readiness is the common gap.
Manufacturing, automotive and commercial vehicles
The difficulty is rarely finding experienced people. It is finding leaders who can run a transition: electrification, a new plant, or a family-owned business professionalising its operations.
- Plant Head / Works Manager
- Head of Quality
- Business Unit Head
- Head of Engineering / R&D
- VP, Manufacturing or Operations
- Head of Supply Chain
- Head of EHS
- Fab Operations Head
- Head of Yield Engineering
- Head of Quality and Reliability
- Head of Process Engineering
- OSAT Plant Head
- Design Centre Head
Semiconductors
There is no domestic pool with commercial fab operating experience at scale, so most senior mandates involve returning Indian talent or experienced expatriates. Design centres are a different market with a deeper local pool.
Where the talent actually comes from
Very few of these mandates are filled from within the sector alone.The judgement in each search is which of these sources fits the mandate, and being honest with the client when the obvious source is exhausted.
01
02
03
04
Manufacturing, quality and supply chain leadership
05
Chemicals, pharmaceuticals, specialty materials
06
Greenfield project and commissioning leadership
07
A growing number in launch, satellite and Earth observation companies overseas will return for real programme ownership. Relocation and compensation structure belong in the first conversation, not at offer
How we assess
How to evaluate a search firm for an industrial mandate
Four questions worth asking any firm you are considering, including us.
Who actually runs the search?
The partner who presents the proposal should be the one doing the market mapping and the candidate conversations. Ask directly, and ask what else they are carrying this quarter.
Where do they look beyond your sector?
A firm that only maps inside your sector runs out of names by week three. Ask which adjacent industries they would draw from and why those transfer.
Can they show a comparable mandate?
A role at comparable scale, stage and standards regime, with what the timeline actually was and whether the leader is still in the seat.
What happens between offer and joining?
Ask how they handle a three-month notice period and a counter-offer from an employer about to miss a delivery date. A firm that closes the file at offer acceptance is not managing the risky part.
Industrial leadership mandates
Senior industrial appointments require discretion. The record below is abridged.
MANDATE
ROLE
SECTOR
YEAR
01
Program Director (Head of Facility Setup)
semiconductor manufacturing equipment
2026
02
Director of Advanced Robotics
Drone Manfacturer
2025
03
General Manager Plant, Mumbai
Tiles & Ceramics company
2025
04
CBO, Pune
Process Controls
2024
05
Plant Head, Chennai
Industrial automation
2024
See the HR consulting service for family run manufacturing businesses
How we run a search
01
02
03
04
Deep-dive assessment
Scale-up experience weighted as heavily as domain depth.
05
06
A 100-day plan agreed with their manager.
Every mandate starts with a conversation.
Tell us about the operation you are building and the milestone it is tied to.
Space tech
India’s private space sector moved from demonstration to commercial execution faster than its leadership pipeline could follow. The people who have taken hardware through qualification, flight and repeat production came almost entirely through ISRO and its centres, and that pool is finite, visible and already being approached.
The gap in nearly every mandate is rate readiness: moving from a handful of flight units to repeatable production without losing the discipline that made the first one work.
Segments we search across
- Launch vehicles, propulsion and space transportation
- Satellite design, manufacturing and constellations
- Spacecraft, payloads and mission systems
- Earth observation, remote sensing and geospatial
- Space situational awareness and in-orbit services
- Subsystem and component suppliers
ENGINEERING AND PROGRAMME
- VP / Head of Engineering
- Programme Director, launch or satellite
- Head of Systems Engineering (MBSE)
- Head of Propulsion
- Head of Avionics and Flight Software
- Head of Guidance, Navigation and Control
- Head of Spacecraft Bus / Platform
- Head of Payload Engineering and Integration
Operations and ground segment
- Head of Mission Operations
- Head of Ground Systems and Ground Stations
- Head of Flight Dynamics
- Head of Telemetry, Tracking and Command
Production, assurance and test
- Head of Manufacturing and Rate Production
- Head of Assembly, Integration and Testing
- Head of Mission and Product Assurance
- Head of Quality and Reliability
- Head of Supply Chain, qualified and long-lead
Commercial and corporate
- CRO / Head of Business Development
- Head of Programmes and Bid Management
- Chief Financial Officer
- Head of Regulatory Affairs (IN-SPACe, SCOMET)
- CHRO / Head of Talent
- Programme Director
- Head of Quality and Airworthiness (AS9100, NADCAP)
- Head of Supply Chain, qualified and long-lead
- Head of Compliance and Export Control (SCOMET)
- Head of Manufacturing, precision or build-to-print
- Head of Certification (DGCA, CEMILAC)
- Head of BD, OEM, tier-1 and offset accounts
- Head of MRO Operations
Aerospace and defence
India’s supplier base into the global aerospace OEMs has grown substantially, and the hiring problem has moved with it. A company winning build-to-print work needs different leadership from one moving into design responsibility, sub-assembly or MRO. Across all of them the constraint is the same: leaders who can hold an airworthiness and traceability regime while the volume goes up.
Questions About Executive Search in India
Can you find someone with flight heritage in India?
Sometimes, and the pool is smaller than most founders expect. Often the better answer is a leader from an adjacent high-reliability environment, such as aerospace tier suppliers, semiconductor equipment or precision manufacturing, with the judgement to learn the domain. We will make that case openly rather than pretending the pool is deeper than it is.
How do you benchmark compensation in a sector this new?
There is no clean survey data for most of these roles yet. We benchmark against adjacent, more mature sectors and adjust for scarcity, using judgement built from live searches rather than a published number. We will tell you when a figure is a genuine market data point and when it is our estimate.
How do you handle notice periods and counter-offers?
Notice periods in this segment run long, often 60 to 90 days for senior operating roles. Counter-offers are a relationship problem, not a paperwork one, and we manage them by keeping the candidate anchored to why they started looking in the first place, not just matching numbers at the end.
Will you approach people at our competitors?
We work within off-limits agreements with our own clients, and we will tell you upfront if that creates a conflict for your search. Outside of that, competitor talent is fair, sourced ground, since that is where most of the relevant experience sits.
Which cities do you cover for industrial mandates?
Across India most notably Chennai, Ahmedabad, Pune for manufacturing roles.
Schedule a Private Search Briefing
directly with a Managing Partner.