UPL has named Jai Shroff to lead its crop protection business, replacing Mike Frank, who has departed as chief executive officer, AgriBusiness Global reports.

The move puts Shroff — a member of the family that has long shaped UPL's strategy — back at the top of the company's core crop protection operations. Mike Frank exits the CEO post after a tenure that spanned a difficult stretch for the global plant-protection market, marked by weak glyphosate prices, destocking across the distribution chain, and thinning margins for generic crop-chemistry suppliers worldwide.

For UPL's grower and distributor base, leadership at the top of a top-five global crop protection supplier matters well beyond the boardroom. UPL supplies a broad portfolio of herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides that compete directly on price with products from BASF, Bayer, Corteva, FMC, and Syngenta in key row-crop markets. A change in who sets that pricing and portfolio strategy feeds straight into input-cost decisions for farmers in North America, Brazil, India, and Europe.

Shroff's return to direct operational control signals continuity rather than a strategic pivot. The company has pursued debt reduction and a streamlining of its product range in recent reporting periods, and the new leadership will be watched for any shift in that direction.

The circumstances and timing of Frank's departure, along with the exact scope of Shroff's new mandate, have not been detailed in the announcement as reported so far. AgriBusiness Wire will track the company's next earnings release and any revised guidance for what the transition means for UPL's product supply and pricing posture heading into the 2025-26 spraying season.