SVP – Commercial Growth — Passenger-Vehicle Business

The mandate

A Chennai passenger-vehicle business is seeking growth while commercial teams have compensated through incentives and tactical offers, increasing retail but obscuring mix, dealer and future claim economics. Dealers receive inconsistent technical communication, customer concern spreads faster than formal campaigns and model-level contribution is unclear after expected warranty. The board has created a dedicated commercial-growth role to restore disciplined demand.

The SVP – Commercial Growth will influence approximately 1,150 employees and material partners across sales, network, customer, finance and field support within a business perimeter near ₹6,100 crore. Scope includes market and segment strategy, pricing, channel programmes, dealer economics, fleet, retail conversion, customer retention and commercial forecast. Quality owns root cause and remedy; finance owns provisions. The SVP must reflect the consequences honestly in growth choices.

The assignment is not to suppress sales until every issue closes. The executive must distinguish affected configurations and cohorts, support transparent customer treatment and direct demand toward propositions the business can fulfil reliably. Incentives should address a genuine barrier, not conceal residual-value concern or force dealers to hold ageing stock.

Commercial feedback must improve engineering decisions. Dealer and customer signals need structured capture, severity and closure, while claims data should inform segment, use-case and product positioning. The leader will ensure field stories do not replace statistical evidence and corporate averages do not silence emerging patterns.

Retail finance and residual value belong in the commercial plan. Incentives can lower the monthly payment while transferring risk to a captive lender, dealer or future used-vehicle channel. The SVP will reconcile cash discount, finance subsidy, repurchase exposure and expected warranty before approving a campaign. Electric and connected variants also require transparent assumptions about battery health and software support at resale. Growth will be judged after these obligations, not at the point a financed unit leaves dealer stock.

Regional mix must be understood below national averages. Urban usage, road conditions, climate, fuel quality and service reach can produce different warranty and value outcomes for the same model. The SVP will target propositions and stock using local evidence, while refusing dealer pressure to place configurations whose service support or duty-cycle fit remains weak.

Why this seat is open

Growth responsibility is currently divided between model, channel and marketing leaders. The board approved a planned new position to create whole-portfolio commercial authority before the following retail cycle. There is no predecessor. A four-to-six-month search allows rigorous automotive and adjacent consumer-platform candidates to be assessed.

What you will own

• Build segment and model growth plans using retail, contribution, warranty, inventory and customer evidence.
• Redesign pricing and incentives around customer value and dealer economics rather than wholesale targets.
• Establish transparent field communication and retention offers for affected customer cohorts.
• Improve dealer demand, inventory and working-capital forecasting.
• Create a commercial feedback loop into quality, product and engineering decisions.
• Qualify fleet and partnership growth against duty cycle, service readiness and lifetime economics.
• Set channel and model exit criteria where margin and warranty cannot meet an approved path.
• Build successors across sales strategy, network, pricing and customer growth.

The first 12 months

The first 60 days will reconcile retail, inventory, incentives, warranty cohorts and dealer economics. By day 90, the SVP will present a revised growth and customer plan, remove programmes that reward ageing wholesale stock and identify cohorts requiring proactive communication or retention.

By month eight, new pricing and dealer programmes should operate in selected segments, field evidence should reach product reviews and fleet offers should include duty-cycle and service assumptions. At least one low-quality volume source will be exited or restructured.

At year-end, retail contribution after expected warranty should improve by 175 basis points, dealer inventory age by 20% and enquiry-to-retail conversion by 12 points in target segments. Repeat purchase or retention intent should recover by 10 points among affected cohorts, without elevated complaints or unprovided commercial commitments.

What the board will measure

• Profitable retail and cash separated from dispatch and incentive volume.
• Warranty evidence changing segment, pricing and customer choices.
• Dealer economics, inventory and trust improving together.
• Customer treatment consistent, timely and supportable operationally.
• Commercial leadership and successors beyond model silos.

The person

You are a passenger-vehicle commercial leader, sales and network executive or customer-growth head who has restored demand during a quality or warranty challenge. You have owned dealer and customer consequences, not merely campaigns. Experience in India or another complex, value-sensitive dealer market is important.

You bring 22–28 years of experience and have carried commercial scope above ₹3,500 crore across at least 800 employees and partners. The board will test an incentive you stopped, a customer cohort you treated proactively and a volume opportunity you rejected after lifecycle economics.

The role is onsite in Chennai with extensive field and dealer travel.

Compensation and terms

The commercial-growth package is ₹2.2–3.0 crore fixed with a performance variable. Outcomes include retail contribution, dealer health, customer recovery, forecast and talent. Dispatch or booking volume alone is excluded. Final terms reflect current mix and the agreed commercial perimeter.

Confidentiality

The manufacturer, models, warranty cohorts and dealer programmes remain confidential. Further information follows qualification and mutual confidentiality. Chennai and the rounded business scale must not be used to identify the brand.