V. Venkata Rao obtained a Ph.D. in 1981 , and MS. In Operations Research in 1979, from the School of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA; an M. Tech. in Mechanical Engineering (specialization in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research) from I.I.T. Kanpur in 1974; and a B.E. in Mechanical Engineering from the Government College of Engineering (now J.N.T.U.) Kakinada in 1971.
He served on the faculty of Information Systems area of I.I.M. Ahmedabad from 1981 to 2014; worked as a systems analyst in the computer centre there from 1974-76. He spent the summer of 1997 at the Infosys Technologies, Benguluru, as a Faculty Fellow. After superannuating from I.I.M. Ahmedabad in 2014, he has been working as an adjunct professor at I.I.M. Udaipur. In the last few years, he has also taught courses at I.I.M. Amritsar, I.I.M. Sambalpur, I.I.M. Nagpur, and at I.I.T. Tirupati.
He teaches and researches in the fields of operations research, operations management, and computer based information systems. He participated in research and consulting projects for public and private sector organizations and government. Published papers in national and international journals in the areas of production planning for multi-stage production systems, optimization algorithms for graphs, and modelling of railway operations.
