Jio Financial Services Appoints Venkata Peri As Group COO

Fintech major Jio Financial Services (JFS) has appointed Venkata Narasimham Peri as its group chief operating officer. The board approved the appointment on December 17 and Peri would take up the role from December 22. 

Important to highlight that Peri has been working with JFS as a senior executive advisor since October 2024. He had been assisting the fintech company’s CEO, CTO, and analytics head to establish the foundation to design and deploy AI and Analytics capabilities in that capacity.

Peri brings over 25 years of experience across segments like finance, tech and advisory to JFS’ C-suite. Prior to joining JFS, the London School of Economics alumnus founded and led US-based health tech firm CognitiveCare for the past six years. He also had been working as the chief AI officer for eye-care network, L V Prasad Eye Institute, since last year.

He has previously worked with firms such as IBM, Deloitte and PwC, and has advised boards and top executives on finance, risk, technology and analytics, mainly in banking and insurance.

Peri holds a master’s degree from the London School of Economics and an MCA from NIT Rourkela. He has also been involved in academic and governance roles, including teaching stints and board positions at Indian institutions.

The group COO role at JFS was earlier held by Charanjit Singh Attra, former CFO of State Bank of India. Attra moved out of the role in July 2024 to take charge as managing director and CEO of JFS’s leasing arm, Jio Leasing Services. He left that role shortly afterwards by November and took up the role of partner at EY. 

Since then, the role had remained vacant, with the company’s senior leadership led by MD & CEO Hitesh Sethia and CFO Abhishek Pathak.

Peri’s appointment comes at a time when JFS is scaling up its financial services play as well as doubling down on its AI capabilities. 

Earlier this month, JFS invested INR 230 Cr across two joint ventures with global asset manager BlackRock. The company infused INR 136 Cr into Jio BlackRock Asset Management and INR 93.5 Cr into Jio BlackRock Investment Advisers through separate rights issues, with BlackRock matching the investment. 

Meanwhile, JFS and BlackRock have also set up a third subsidiary, Jio BlackRock Broking, and have applied for a broking licence. All three units are currently building teams and finalising their go-to-market plans.

For the September quarter, JFS reported a net profit of INR 695 Cr, up 1% YoY. Operating revenue rose 42% YoY to INR 981.4 Cr, with interest income accounting for the bulk of the revenue.