Chief Financial Officer / India
The definition changed what the board could conclude
- Finance responsibility through three heads
- 28 staff
- ₹4.2 crore FY 27 expense; separate ₹1.1 crore control programme
- Accounts, planning and colocation finance
- 32 years
- Career from July 1994; CFO from September 2020
- Provisional first-board allowance
- 24 days
- No statutory seat; consent and assessment preparation remain
Decisions & consequences
01The occupancy percentage I used answered only part of the capital question
In a 2022 expansion discussion, I presented 282 occupied rack positions out of 400 as 70.5% occupancy. The figure was accurate. I nevertheless allowed it to imply a more complete account of capacity than it supplied. Contractually committed IT capacity was 1.32 MW out of 2.4 MW installed, or 55%. Rack use and committed power were different dimensions. Neither percentage alone showed which new customers the site could support or which physical constraint a proposed hall would resolve.
The commercial sponsor favoured a ₹28 crore new-hall proposal, arguing that a fuller physical footprint and future customer requirements justified moving early. Rohan Qorvemi asked the team to separate rack positions, contracted power and the actual supported configuration. I funded a ₹41 lakh review of the capacity and financial account. Qualified engineering and safety owners retained capability decisions; finance did not infer that uncontracted megawatts were automatically available for any equipment arrangement. Customer prospects also remained distinct from signed commitments.
The board chose ₹8.6 crore of defined improvements to the existing proposition and deferred the separate new-hall proposal. The alternatives had different scopes. Their ₹19.4 crore arithmetic difference was not a cash saving, a valuation or proof that expansion would never be needed. The chosen work still required delivery and appropriate technical approvals. The deferred proposal could return with better evidence about demand and the constraint it addressed. We retained that possibility rather than turn the decision into a permanent rule against additional capacity.
My responsibility was to correct the paper I had made too simple. A valid number can be misleading when it is asked to answer a different question. The review did not uncover fictitious customers or restate the physical count. It changed the way the board understood the relationship between space, power and investment. The ₹41 lakh cost remained visible, and no realised revenue uplift was assigned to the revised account.
I would now state the decision and its relevant capacity dimensions before selecting an occupancy measure. A financial presentation should make a complex operating choice easier to examine, not remove the distinction that determines whether the proposed expenditure is useful. The CFO must be willing to challenge the meaning attached to a correct figure, including a meaning introduced by their own paper.
Lower energy use did not establish a better efficiency ratio or the same cost reduction
A 2024–25 review compared two complete annual periods with the same stated facility and IT measurement boundaries. Total facility energy fell from 4.8 million to 4.2 million kWh. IT-equipment energy fell from 3.0 million to 2.4 million kWh. The corresponding power usage effectiveness ratios were 1.60 and 1.75. The facility used 600,000 fewer kWh, a 12.5% reduction, while IT energy fell 20%. The higher ratio and lower absolute consumption were both true; neither could be omitted because it complicated the account.
The operating presentation initially described lower consumption as an efficiency achievement. Rohan asked that the changing IT load be retained in the interpretation. I supported a ₹33 lakh measurement and financial review, with qualified facilities colleagues responsible for the boundaries and technical explanation. We did not claim that the ratio alone measured computing productivity, emissions or a causal improvement in the cooling system. The comparison was an account of these periods, not a universal judgement about the facilities.
A separate illustration applied uniform energy prices of ₹7.20 and ₹8.10 per kWh to those volumes. The calculated charges were ₹3.456 crore and ₹3.402 crore, a ₹5.4 lakh difference. These were illustrative price inputs, not the site's actual tariff or utility account. The calculation omitted demand charges, taxes, fuel and other real billing components and was not used to value a project. Its purpose was to show why a lower quantity need not produce the same percentage reduction in an energy-price comparison. The ₹33 lakh review expense was separate and did not become a claimed annual saving.
Commercial colleagues wanted a simpler improvement statement for customers, while facilities wanted the load conditions understood. I recommended retaining consumption, PUE, price and the defined charge together, with the limits of the interpretation explicit. The board accepted that account and asked future investment papers to distinguish measured changes from proposed benefits. We did not postpone reporting until one measure could tell a uniformly favourable story.
The lesson was to decide which question each measure answers before giving it a financial conclusion. The CFO can help make technical evidence useful without selecting only the measure that flatters the period. I would establish those definitions at the beginning of the observation, so a later change in load or tariff can be examined without rebuilding the meaning of the comparison.
Repaying the amount the receivable book did not support
In 2024 the management liquidity paper treated a ₹12 crore receivable balance as though it supported the same borrowing value throughout. The facility agreement used a narrower eligibility basis. The reviewed book contained ₹4 crore overdue beyond its agreed eligibility window, ₹2 crore disputed, ₹1 crore related-party balances and ₹5 crore eligible receivables. These were separate categories without overlap. Under this particular facility's 80% advance rate, the eligible amount supported ₹4 crore, while ₹4.8 crore was drawn. The terms described this facility, not a general rule for every lender or borrower.
Treasury wanted time to collect some excluded balances before making a repayment, because cash was also needed for the operating plan. The account team expected several customer discussions to resolve favourably. I accepted that those receipts could improve the position later, but they were not eligible borrowing support at the review date. We reconciled the account with the lender and relevant advisers, retaining the contractual conditions instead of treating expected collection as a substitute for them. The accounting receivables remained subject to their own assessment.
We repaid ₹80 lakh from unrestricted cash. The balance immediately before that repayment was ₹3.2 crore and immediately afterwards ₹2.4 crore, with no other movement included in that immediate balance comparison. The repayment brought the stated drawing to ₹4 crore against the reviewed base. It did not establish that every receivable would be collected, that the facility would remain available under every future condition or that ₹2.4 crore funded all later obligations. The wider forecast and agreement conditions still required continuing review.
The board received the reconciliation between the receivable book, eligible base, drawn amount and cash consequence. I did not label all excluded balances bad debts or use the eligibility calculation to prescribe accounting impairment. Equally, I did not retain a more comfortable headroom figure simply because the customer relationships were valuable. Finance had to explain what each account meant and what action followed from the actual lending terms.
I would make this reconciliation part of the first liquidity presentation rather than a correction after the larger balance has become familiar. An asset can be real without being available for the financing purpose management has assumed. The useful result was a corrected drawing and a clearer account of the cash left, including the constraints that remained after the immediate repayment.
Securing premises duration before accepting a longer customer undertaking
In June 2025 a proposed customer arrangement would run from July 2025 to June 2032, with ₹4.6 crore annual service fees under its stated scope. The relevant property's existing lease ended in May 2028. A possible renewal had appeared in the commercial planning assumptions, but it had not yet become an agreed extension. The customer term therefore depended on premises access beyond the period already secured. That dependency was separate from technical capacity and could not be settled by the attractive annual fee.
The sales sponsor wanted to sign promptly, arguing that the customer had alternatives and that the landlord relationship was established. Property colleagues considered an extension likely but needed to negotiate its conditions. I asked the board to make the longer customer commitment conditional on resolving the premises position through the authorised legal and property process. We spent ₹46 lakh on diligence and negotiation. I did not treat the CFO's confidence in a relationship as evidence that the company already held the additional access.
The agreed extension added five years from June 2028 through May 2033. Annual rent during that extension was ₹1.5 crore, compared with ₹1.2 crore under the existing period. The ₹30 lakh annual difference described a future contractual cost for the extension period, not rent already paid in 2025 or a charge imposed retrospectively. The new access period covered the proposed customer end date, and the company proceeded with the customer arrangement after the relevant approvals. The annual service fee remained a contracted commercial amount, separate from collected cash and accounting recognition.
The agreement gave the business a clearer duration basis at a visible cost. It did not remove operating, customer, technical or other lease risks, and it left the company with premises obligations beyond the particular customer's stated term. We kept that additional exposure in the board account. The ₹46 lakh preparation expense also remained incurred. Neither the longer access nor the customer fee was described as a risk-free return.
I would compare those dates before the revenue forecast becomes the main reference point in the negotiation. A long customer relationship can be valuable, but the enterprise must examine the resources and rights needed to support it for the promised period. Finance contributes by making the dependency and its cost visible while management still has a meaningful choice about what to agree.