Silicon valley serves as the global center for high technology and innovation and as you may have heard there is a large number of high tech Indians in Silicon Valley. A few decades ago, it seemed like a long distant dream to move abroad and achieve big there but soon some great personalities took the risk with the determination to succeed.
You must have heard about Sundar Pichai, a man who had nothing but with his hardwork and intelligence now has become the CEO of the world’s largest search engine, Google. Not only him there are various other untold stories of talented Indians to pushed boundaries, worked hard and held positions of power in the world in the field of technology. Let’s have a look:
- Sundar Pichai
The Indian American business executive is currently the chief executive officer (CEO) of Alphabet Inc. and its subsidiary Google. He began his career as a materials engineer and in 2004 became part of Google. He made big contributions to the development of Google drive and also maps and Gmail. He added Android in the list of Google Products in 2013 and became the CEO 9f Google in 2015. Pichai was also a part of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people in 2016 and also 2020.
- Satya Nadella
The current executive chairman and CEO of Microsoft started his career at Sun Microsystems as a member of it technology staff. He joined Microsoft in 1992. He has been credited for his contributions to bring Microsoft’s database, Windows Server and developer tools to its Azure cloud. Nadella was declared the CEO of Microsoft in 2014 and also conducted the purchase of professional networking site LinkedIn. He was titled the Financial Times person of the year 2019 and also the businessman of the Year by Fortune magazine.
- Shantanu Narayen
The chairman, president, and chief executive officer (CEO) of Adobe Inc. started his career in a Silicon Valley startup Measurex Automation Systems in 1986 where he made computer control systems. He also worked in Apple before moving to Adobe in 1998 as the Senior vice-president of worldwide product development. Then in 2007 he was appointed the CEO of Adobe. He became the Global Indian of the Year” in 2018 by The Economic Times of India. He also received the Indian honour of Padma Shri in 2019.
- Indra Nooyi
The former chairperson and chief executive officer (CEO) of PepsiCo is now the 11th member of Amazon’s board and part of Starbucks COO. She began her career as a product manager at Johnson & Johnson and joined PepsiCo in 1994. She was appointed the CEO of PepsiCo in 2006 and stepped down from the post in 2018 but stayed the chairman till 2019. In the same year she became the co-director of the firm Connecticut Economic Resource Center. She was honored with the title of the CEO of the Year by the Global Supply Chain Leaders Group in July 2009. Forbes considered her as the 3rd most powerful women of the world in 2008.
- Vinod Khosla
The co-founder of Sun Microsystems and the founder of Khosla Ventures started his career as electronic design automation at start-up Daisy Systems. Khosla co-founded the Sun Microsystems in 1982 and served as its first CEO and left the company in 1986 to work as a venture Capitalist. In 2004, he founded Khosla Ventures as his own capital firm. He was part of Forbes 400 richest people of United States in 2014 and then was ranked 353 on the Forbes 400 list of the richest people in America in 2020.
- Rashmi Sinha
CEO of San Francisco-based technology company SlideShare started her career with her own user-experience consultancy, then later she co-founded Uzanto where she worked on projects for companies like eBay, Blue Shield, AAA etc. Simultaneously she found SlideShare with help of brother and husband. I’m 2012, LinkedIn acquired SlideShare for a amount of more than $100 million. Rashmi became part of the World’s Top 10 Women Influencers in Web 2.0 by Fast Company. In 2012 she ranked 8 on the Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs list released by Fortune magazine.
- Ajay bhatt
The developer behind several widely used technologies nowadays, including USB (Universal Serial Bus), AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port), PCI Express, Platform Power Management architecture and various chipset improvements is Ajay Bhatt. He began his career as a senior staff architect at Intel 1990. He is also known for his contributions in the development of the next-generation Client Platform architecture. He is honoured with the Achievement in Excellence Award, Outstanding Achievement in Science & Technology Award, and the European Inventor Award during his crucial career years.
- Vinod Dham
The ‘Father of the Pentium Chip’ is a mentor, advisor and along with this part of the boards of companies, including startups funded through his India-based fund Indo-US Venture Partners, where he is the founding managing director. He began his career at Delhi-based semiconductor manufacturer Continental Devices in 1971. He joined Inter Co. In 1985 where he led the development of Pentium processor which is why he is called the “Pentium Engineer”. Then in 2015, he became the co-founder and CEO of Acadgild, an online educational platform.
There are a lot more Indians in Silicom Valley than written in the article. India’s great talents and brains becoming big entrepreneurs in the Silicon Valley is a very proud moment for India but at the same time we can’t deny the fact that it is brain drain for India. There is a need for better development of Indian firms for the growth of the country.
