Group Head of GBS, British American Tobacco

Sanjay Patel

Sanjay joined British American Tobacco on April 2nd, 2017 as its Group Head of Global Business Services (GBS).

Sanjay’s career spans over 25 years across the globe, having worked in New Zealand, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Ireland and the U.S., where he held various leadership positions. Most recently, Sanjay was with Rio Tinto, a leading mining and exploration company, as their Managing Director for GBS Finance, HR, Data & Analytics, Service Management, Global Process Ownership, Quality Assurance and GBS Strategy.

Prior to joining Rio Tinto in November 2013, Sanjay spent 22 years with a global U.S. pharmaceutical company, Merck & Co. Inc., in various leadership roles in GBS, finance, audit, logistics, marketing, compliance, IT and operations.

Sanjay brings to BAT a wealth of experience in finance and leading multi-function shared services environments including a track record for developing and leading high performing organisations and teams. Sanjay’s role in BAT is to provide strategic leadership and accelerate the evolution of the GBS model in line with the BAT 2020 strategy and strengthen and consolidate the GBS organisation to provide quality, productivity, agility and innovation to employee and business services.

Sanjay is a Fellow of the Australian Society of Certified Practising Accountants and a Fellow of the Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand.