Avtar Sehmbi

Avtar Sehmbi is a Global Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technology Officer. He builds businesses, fixes them under scrutiny, and takes them through acquisition and separation when required. His remit brings together operations, technology, transformation and risk across business divisions of Fortune 50, Big 4 and FTSE 100 organisations.

Financial services has been the core of his career, particularly investment banking and insurance, with earlier leadership in energy and telecommunications. Across more than 60 markets, he has led the disciplines that drive enterprise performance, including organisational design, cost, execution, resilience, governance, technology, data and risk.

Leading global change across market entry, expansion and exit, he has directed the operations, technology and risk dimensions of mergers, acquisitions and divestitures approaching $80 billion. Through restructuring programmes and the establishment of Global Capability Centres, he led workforce transitions across international delivery hubs.

Alongside his executive duties, he has held statutory board responsibilities, providing oversight of strategy, performance, capital allocation and succession. His executive remit has included operational risk, aspects of financial risk oversight, consent order remediation, direct engagement with regulators and supervisory authorities, and the governance of international joint ventures and their shareholder groups.

Supporting market expansion, he established greenfield technology and operations capabilities across Asia, the Gulf and Africa. He has also led responsible innovation at scale as Chair of the Ethical AI and Cloud Centres of Excellence, governing AI and cloud adoption across more than 30 markets, covering data residency and third-party risk, and leading regulatory readiness for new requirements, including the EU AI Act and DORA.

His earlier career included the technology, operations and risk workstreams within client transformation programmes for JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group and London Stock Exchange Group.