The newest member of Virginia Tech's BOV (appointed today)? Mehul Sanghani. Safe to say that is an athletics-minded individual joining the group. The #Hokies named the football players lounge after him in 2021 following a large gift to VT athletics.https://t.co/sBmPOJgWHU pic.twitter.com/MbNrpYjHbf— Andy Bitter (@AndyBitterVT) April 11, 2026
He was originally appointed to the BoV by Terry McAuliffe in 2014 and re-upped by Ralph Northam in 2018. This will be his second stint on the Board.
Have to say, it is interesting to see a very big athletics donor and supporter being appointed to the Board right after Sands announces his intentions to step down.
And for those who are wondering who he is, he's the founder of Octo who cashed out at $1.5billion a couple years back, and has been making significant contributions back to the school when he can. In 2021 the school renovated the football lounge and renamed it the Sanghani Player Lounge due to it being funded as part of a larger gift to Athletics.
He and his wife also funded the establishment and endowment for The Market at VT, for those familiar with it.
Comments
best news ever!
I mean he knows a thing or two building an organization, sounds like as good of a board pick as any.
Its unclear based on the very little I know of octo if he can build an organization, he got his company sold, that doesn't mean internal organization worked well, or if at all. I've worked on a successful mulit-bilion dollar program that has never had a organization chart. It went 7 months with out a PM and still is going, its a mess and communication has always been terrible, but the hire smart people that know when to get out duct tape and bailing wire. when needed. At this point the lessons learned (more like observed) is so large its not useful.l to knowing how to run the program.
And maybe we need some one to build a paper tiger so VT gets "sold" to a P2,, but thats not building an organization.
Yes of course. The 1.2 billion dollar sale to IBM of his roughly 1,500 people organization in 2022 was definetly just a "paper tiger."
Im sorry you had a bad experience working somewhere that didnt have a fancy organizational chart but that doesn't have anything do with mehul's credentials. He was also appointed to the board in 2014 and 2018.
Yes because IBM has never made stupid purcahse and ever company evaluation are spot on and greatly reflect the organization of a company.
He was already on the board and no better organization was brought to VT, its been a mess for decades.
He built a company, he didnt take over and fix a company those are different tasks and require different skills, and while building they are often very disorganized because at 10 people he made all the decisions, probably at 100 too but then started to many decisions amd most hang on too long amd still make all decisions at 25people, which then other people just start doing because decisions arent made fast enough which break organizations up and causes other issues, but its working so ignore the cracks amd by the tI me you have 1000 people its running and people are doing and other companies are ready to buy you so you dont fix cause it cost money which hurts your evaluation so you keep letting bad organization exist because its cheaper than hiring layers of management.
I know someone at Octo, now IBM. Very well managed business and at the time of acquisition all employees were retained. Not sure about now but high retention rate normally indicates a very well built org. But that doesn't necessarily mean he builds a well organized business. at some point the founder/ceo is mostly just working strategy and selling. the management they hire just below them become in charge of building and maintaining the organization.
all that said. Who cares. He's not being brought on BOV to build an organization. The new President will do that, from what I belive is the actual benefit of this BOV change a clear directional voice that understands modern era business and values academics and athletics cooperatively.
I agree with this whole heartedly, I was replying to a poster that said he would be helpful in reorganization of VT. Which is giving him credit for things that he may have done but probably didn't. He may have been the greatest CEO ever, but just selling a company doesn't prove any skills of a person.
Yeah I figured you did. My reply was to both of you actually, not just your posts.
I disagree with your last sentence here though. Selling a company proves lots of skills in my opinion. I've sold a few and I regard myself as fairly clever but I've never sold anything for a billion dollars. To do that takes some serious skill. Maybe not "build an organization skill" but some serious skills. I'll just leave it at that unless you want me to elaborate.
and i upvoted you above to counter the downvotes. no need for those.
I have worked a number of startups and been on the otherside in M&A and sold my one company. I have never seen a consistent skill base and at least once (maybe twice) I saw pure dumb luck. So to be more clear, to me selling a company doesn't mean you have a specific skill. My skill was timing, i saw the market turning and cashed out. But my company didn't mske me money on the sale, the assets did.
The whole private equity ownership (at least partial) of Octo also means Octo had backing from people who buy and sell companies for a living which means its harder to attribute responsibility for the sale to IBM.
I think your underselling your skill. Timing as they say is everything. Recognition of the right timing is called wisdom which is what I would say you have.
For Octo, Before having those resources Sanghani first had to create, plan, seed and sell his vision to those PEs. those are all great skills. Managing a growing company with institutional investors is also no joke. (Personally I hate PE investors because of all the reporting that's involved.) Then even with the resources of PEs Sanghani was leading the company to its exit.
I think the word "consistent" is what's wrong. Everyone is different. Some have more skills than others and some just have dumb luck. But selling any company for a billion+ takes mad skills.
I feel like this simple point is lost in all discourse today. Yes, luck plays a huge factor in success. But skill and hard work also matter.
I'm not sure why this is a conversation... Margaret Ann Smith is farmer. Rocovich has had most of his success as a lawyer. McCarthy has had success in the military and defense sector. Pearson is a business owner/founder and ex-military. Looks like at most 25% of the BoV has significant experience in the education sector (beyond being on the board).
He's just as qualified for the role as anyone else on the board.
Skill and hard work set ideal conditions for good luck to be significantly more likely to happen.
It's a conversation because until recent events, it's a topic most of us have not been exposed to.
to be fair, kingjames did not say he was unqualified.
He is saying that it is unclear he was directly involved in building the org of octo and that selling a company doesn't necessarily track to a complimentary skill set to helping VTs future. further I think his point is not directly about Sanghani and about ppl that build and sell companies in general.
Yes, I never said Sanghani didnt have skills or didnt work hard or didnt deserve it. I said it was unclear if he could help VT reorganize based on his experience not that he couldn't help VT. I do not think any of those things because i don't know him. Attributing a specific skill due to the sale of a company is in my opinion very hard to do. Every company I have worked at (which is a lot names with all the buying and selling I've been a part of) has had vastly different qualities at the helm and throughout. The only thing I can think that they've all had in common was luck. Because I've seen companies with great ideas and great hardworking people fail. Heck I was at a platform/software as a service start up in 2004. Those terms didnt exist. Companies still talked about bandwidth in T3 lines. Cable modems weren't available everywhere, fios, infinity didn't exist and we designed an internet based data processing service (very niche data). It failed because no one wanted to trust sending their data put of their network and the bandwidth was huge. We didnt have funding to start building on premium which was in the road map. Now no one wants to store their own data (hyperbole i know). There is so many factors to building a company that its very hard to determine how it was done
I agree. Selling a business is as hard as running a business. Working a sale while running a business is exhausting, trust me.
Have you ever had to design a product to support both logos without any of the team knowing you have two sets of logos and only one will be used based on the sale date. Im lucky I avoided that project cause id be scared shirtless if the CEO had to approve all final designs.
Ummmm. what? metaphor and new benchmark for VT excellence is a pseudo PMP credentialed consultant "working" on a said "multi-billionaire dollar" successful government program measured by CPARs (lol).
Seen him around some tailgates on gamedays. You wouldn't think billionaire when you see him, seems like the normal chill guy, which is great that you can still be grounded with that much cash. And its a big win to have someone with his mindset on the BOV (appreciates sports importance while also being university focused). We just gotta hope the rest of the BOV ends up like him (or enough of them). He's just one voice. He's been on the BOV before multiple times and you see how athletics kept sliding. One person can only do so much.
This is the best take away ive seen in this thread (along with Fenley's response). He is neuvorich so he still doesn't have the disconnected mindset and understands being level headed which is important to have a level head voice that understands that college is expensive and thats an issue.
Wondering if he was the $20MM anonymous donor?
People with names on things don't usually give money anonymously in my experience
If my sources are correct, no.
I want to say there was a small degree of discussion here regarding who it may have been. I'm curious if anyone here has any insights as to who it was? To Fernley's point above, most folks with that level of worth and means, don't do things anonymously.
For someone to lay down $20MM large and not want to be known is pretty impressive.
I read it was from Brad Hobbs (current BOV member.) That's the rumor anyway.
If that were the case, man, I wouldn't mind having his problems.
Shit yeah. I'd be having fun at a sportsbook and the craps table.
Am i the only one who didn't realize he wasn't already/still on the board
No, I was surprised also.
My cynical mind had me wondering if there was a political slant towards him being re-announced.
the way I read it , Sanghani was on the board 2014-2022, and not on the board the past 4 years. He seems to a consistent (D) pick who is an advocate and supporter of the football program. Meanwhile, Rocovich seems to be a regular (R) selection who is an advocate and supporter of the football program.
Hokies success is a bipartisan issue!
Out of all the commencement speeches I've ever heard throughout my long life, his is the only one I actually remember. The dude is just impressive
Also an investor in Benny's.
Dangit I haven't had Benny's since I got to TN and now I want some. Still haven't found a great pizza place in town
Have you tried Italiano Cafe on State Street?
In Bristol? Alas, I am in Chattanooga. Community Pie, Lupi's and Tailgate Brewing are all fine, but I haven't found one that I love over the others (and none at the Benny's price point). Having the same trouble with Mexican food here. It's all adequate, but not fantastic
My bad. I thought you moved to Bristol.
Is Hair of the Dog still there?
Yes, but I haven't been yet. Worth a visit?
I swung by there on an afternoon in 2009 on a cross country road trip. I remember it being a cool bar but wasn't crowded that time of the day. Mostly I remember talking to a guy who was lamenting his job and how he wanted to travel. He couldn't wrap his head around that fact that you can get in your vehicle and drive across the country.
Benny's is the only pizza I've ever had that gave me Beer Burps
That isn't really a positive. Benny's went out of business back in 2017.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benny%27s
Wrong Benny's. Try the pizza one with a location in Blacksburg: https://www.bennysva.com/#locations
They're consistently expanding into college towns/areas due to popularity after replacing Gumby's in Blacksburg.
I grew up in New England. You mention Benny's and a five and dime store is what comes to mind, not a okay pizza place.
And non-college towns. The ones in Hampton and Chesapeake aren't anywhere near a campus
I'm clearly not fully tapped in with how they've expanded! I know they used to target college areas, but I guess they've done well enough to branch out more.
I'm buddies with the one of the owners. They have 25 last I talked with him, but that's probably been a year. It's not just college towns, though they started that way. Places with a small downtown area as well.
Hey the Newport News one is 'just' 7-8 miles from Christopher Newport and the Chesapeake one is 14 miles from ODU...ok that's not exactly 'college town ; fair enough lol.
I guess the Chesapeake one is only 4 miles from Cedar Road University (I'm a TCC alumnus, I get to make that joke)
Wrong one. Benny's is alive and well and killing it.
nice life he must live.....