Pichai in elite club of PIOs heading global giants
12 Aug 2015 6:08 AM IST
As the new CEO of a re-organised Google, India-born Sundar Pichai has joined an elite league of over a dozen <g data-gr-id="51">Indian origin</g> persons holding top posts at global corporations with <g data-gr-id="64">collective</g> turnover of about $400 billion.
In a significant restructuring at Google, Pichai has been named the new CEO of the technology giant after the company co-founder Larry Page announced the formation of a new umbrella firm Alphabet, of which Google will be a part. Page himself will be Alphabet CEO.
Pichai, 43, has joined the league of Indra Nooyi, Lakshmi Mittal, Ajay Banga, among many other Indian-origin persons at the helm at large conglomerates headquartered abroad.
Meanwhile, there are many other Indians heading the businesses at relatively smaller companies abroad, <g data-gr-id="57">specially</g> in <g data-gr-id="56">IT</g> sector, but at least 12 large companies have got India-born chief executives.
These include Microsoft (Satya Nadella), PepsiCo (Indra Nooyi), ArcelorMittal (Lakshmi Mittal), Diageo (Ivan Menezes), Reckitt Benckiser (Rakesh Kapoor), MasterCard (Ajay Banga), DBS Group Holdings (Piyush Gupta),
SanDisk (Sanjay Mehrotra), Global Foundries (Sanjay Jha), Cognizant (Francisco Dsouza) and Adobe (Shantanu Narayen). International magazine Time once termed CEOs as India’s leading “export” and said that the subcontinent could be “the ideal training ground for global bosses”.
While Google reported a $66 billion revenue in 2014, Microsoft had recorded turnover of over
$86 billion last year, PepsiCo’s annual revenue stood at nearly $67 billion in 2014, ArcelorMittal’s annual revenue stood at $79.26 billion, Diageo had $21 billion, Reckitt Benckiser $13.75 billion and SanDisk at $6.62 billion.
In the past, giants like Citigroup, Vodafone, Motorola and Deutsche Bank have also had Indian-origin CEOs. Moreover, former Google Executive Nikesh Arora, who is currently President of Japanese telecom major SoftBank, is likely to be its next CEO as SoftBank’s founder and chief executive Masayoshi Son has chosen Arora to be his successor.
According to human resource experts, the significant rise of India-born executives at global companies can largely be attributed to the technical skills and the behavioural patterns which make them very much adaptable to any kind of situation they come across.
Experts believe that Indians focus on good education and ability to work in difficult situations are
<g data-gr-id="45">aiding</g> to this rising trend and more and more Indians could rise to top positions at global companies in near future.
PM Modi, IT Minister Prasad <g data-gr-id="97">praise</g> Pichai on Twitter
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday joined a big Twitter rush to congratulate India-born Sundar Pichai on his appointment as the CEO of the newly restructured Google.
“Congratulations @sundarpichai. My best wishes for the new role at @google,” Modi tweeted after the announcement.
Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad too tweeted his greetings, saying: “Really proud to note that #India born @sundarpichai has been appointed as CEO of @google”.
Microsoft Chairman Satya Nadella and Pichai’s former colleague and SoftBank President Nikesh Arora conveyed their best wishes.
Nadella tweeted: “Congrats @sundarpichai, well deserved.” Arora, who was Pichai’s colleague at Google, described the new chief as “a brilliant guy, clear thinker, gets things done and a wonderful person at that”.
In a lighter vein, he tweeted: “Now I feel cheated :).” Arora had quit Google last year, where he was serving as the Chief Business Officer to join Japan’s SoftBank Corp. Bret Taylor, co-creator of Google Maps, ex-CTO of Facebook and co-founder of technology Quip, also congratulated Pichai.
Congratulating Pichai, industry body Nasscom said he will be “instrumental in infusing a new sense of enthusiasm and innovation in the sector globally”.
“Sundar Pichai is a new-age leader and with his immense experience in the field of software products, he will be a valuable asset for Google and the industry in its next phase of evolution and growth,” it said.
Pichai, 43, was named CEO of the newly organised Google, becoming the third chief executive of the company, after Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt and co-founder Larry Page.Pichai is a B Tech from IIT-Kharagpur, an MS from Stanford University and an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania.
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