Amit Rai, Principal
About Amit
Amit Rai has approximately three decades of experience with providing financial and
operational leadership to large global organization. Amit has served as the Chief Accounting
Officer (CAO) for Cyrus One, Laureate Education, and Remy International. Amit holds a
Certified Public Accountant certification in the United States and a Chartered Professional
Accountant in Canada. He actively teaches a wide array of technical accounting courses for
the American Institute of CPA (AICPA).
He started myController with the vision of providing a high quality, executive level service at
price point that makes economic sense for high growth, emerging businesses.
His passion, strong values, and commitment to quality is the fabric of who we are as a firm. Refer below for Amit's Testimonials!
Prior Experience
2015 - 2018:
Senior Vice President & Chief Accounting Officer of CYRUSONE, INC. (cyrusone.com), a global data center company specializing in providing services to the Fortune 1000 and cloud companies, (NASDAQ: CONE). The enterprise value doubled over 3 years to approximately $8 billion.
2007 - 2015:
Senior Vice President & Chief Accounting Officer of LAUREATE EDUCATION INC. (laureate.net), then a global leader in providing higher education in 29 countries, (NASDAQ: LAUR), with revenues of approximately $5 billion, over 80 institutions on more than 200 campuses, and 64,000 employees. Over 8 years the Company tripled its size through 42 acquisitions in Latin America, Europe, Asia and Africa.
Prior to 2007:
Vice President, Corporate Controller and Principal Accounting Officer of REMY INTERNATIONAL INC. (formerly Delco Remy), (remyinc.com), then a tier-one OEM automotive/heavy duty and aftermarket manufacturer of automotive and industrial components.
Career Highlights
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IPO Preparedness / SOX: Led the IPO preparedness and SOX implementation for Laureate
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Technical Accounting / SEC Reporting: Led the preclearance process with the Office of the
Chief Accountant, SEC, for a consolidation matter for which no U S GAAP exists
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M&A / Integration: Led the M&A advisory group in structuring acquisitions. Consummated and Integrated 45+ acquisitions in 30+ countries and prepared SEC filings for these acquisitions
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Debt / Equity offerings: Issued public equity and debt totaling $5+ billion, with
multiple offerings/year
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Process Improvements & Change Management: Established regional offices in multiple countries.
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ERP & Financial Systems assessments-to-implementation: Led the end-to-end process reengineering involving global ERP roll-out. Implemented Hyperion. Compressed record-to-report cycle time
Testimonials
Gary Wojtaszek - President & CEO of CyrusOne
“He is without question an accounting savant that understands all of the FASB and SEC accounting rules and regulations required to be complied with as a public company, whether its normal 10-K, 10-Q and proxy filing, or the nuances of relying on audits that are not PCAOB compliant to financial securities from bonds, follow on equity offerings,…..”
Olivier Bouwer - Assurance Partner, PwC
“Amit was an exceptional CAO, his technical skills is on par with any big four national office
and his ability to create structures that ensure timely financial reporting with desperate
systems allowed him to prepare the Company for their eventual IPO.”
Eilif Serck-Hanssen - CEO of Laureate Education
“Amit Rai is an extraordinary CAO and a great partner to the CFO. He is extremely technical,
but still has the operational instincts to dig in and resolve operational issues. He thrives at
dealing with complex situations. He’s liked and respected by staff, peers and board members.
As his CFO and direct supervisor for nearly 8 years, I’d be delighted to serve as reference for
Amit’s next endeavor.”
Keyu Zhu - Advisory Partner of KPMG
“I have had the pleasure of working with Amit over many years, on projects ranging from
application of technical accounting, financial reporting, US GAAP and IFRS conversions, to
integration of overseas acquisitions, and SEC matters. It was exciting, challenging, and a
good learning experience every time. I believe any finance organization can benefit from
Amit & expertise as a chief accounting officer. But what I learned most was from Amit as a
person: his humor and humility, his care for his people, and above all, his integrity.”