India-born Sundar Pichai is new CEO of Google

mangaloretoday.com

Sundar Pichai, over the last couple of years, has grown into one of the most powerful executives at Google. With today’s announcement about his elevation to the post of CEO and the formation of a new parent company of ’Alphabet’, Google can’t be known as the search company, though Pichai through and through can be defined as one of the most powerful people in technology industry.

He’s led quite an interesting life and at 43 he’s risen to the apex post of CEO at Google, which is owner of dominant internet platforms like Search, Maps, YouTube, Chrome and of course, Android. Here are 10 key facts that tell you more about him.

 

1. Born in Chennai in 1972, Pichai went to do his Bachelors in Engineering at IIT Kharagpur in Metallurgical Engineering. Then he moved on to the US and did his MS in Material Sciences and Engineering from Stanford University and an MBA from the Wharton School in the University of Pennsylvania.

2. Pichai’s father, as reported in a Businessweek profile, withdrew $1000 from the family savings to cover for his son’s flight to the US and other expenses when he was travelling to the US for studies.

3. Many people don’t know this, but Pichai is not an early Googler. He joined Google in 2004 where he was responsible for products like Chrome, Chrome OS and even Google Drive. Before it, he was actually was a management consultant with McKinsey & Company specialising in metallurgy.

4. Sundar Pichai is married and has a daughter and son. He married his long-time girlfriend Anjali. According to Silicon India, he is also an avid player of Chess. He loves cricket and was actually the captain of his high school cricket team.

5.  According to Business Insider, Pichai was instrumental in convincing Tony Fadell in selling Nest to Google. Fadell was formerly an Apple employee and is widely known as the father of the iPod. When he left Apple, he started Nest, which has released a new type of internet-connected Thermostat and fire detector. Nest, at Google, err, well, now Alphabet, operates as a separate entity.

6.  Pichai was in the running for the post of CEO at Microsoft, before Satya Nadella was announced as its CEO. Before, this Pichai had the chance to leave Google in 2011, and lead the team working on products at Twitter. Google paid him $50 million in stocks to retain him.

7.  Sundar Pichai is believed to be one of the most politically correct and neutral executives in a large company like Google. While this is true, he was at constant loggerheads with the former head of Android, Andy Rubin. Eventually, Pichai won the round and Rubin left the Android team to work on a robotics project before eventually exiting Google.

8.  Pichai joined Google the very day Gmail was launched. Initially, he was working on the team that worked on the Search Toolbar. He was also the guy, who managed to convince then CEO Eric Schmidt to create its own web browser, which we now know as Chrome. Over the years, Chrome has become the world’s most popular web browser.

9.  Despite, the new arrangement at Alphabet and Google, Pichai retains control of the product management of YouTube even though the unit will run as a different company with Susan Wojcicki as its CEO.

10.  Pichai, comes from a humble background. Pichai’s father, worked as an electrical engineer in the General Electric (British) company, while his mother worked as a stenographer.

11.  Before today, Google, just like Microsoft earlier, has had only two CEOs in its history -- Larry Page and Eric Schmidt. Pichai, just the way Nadella is at Microsoft, is the third CEO of the company and is the first non-white CEO.

12.  At Google last October, Pichai was made the VP of all products. As a part of Larry Page’s L-Team, he’s thought to be his right hand man, and the obvious choice to run the company, if Page wasn’t doing it himself.