Sundar Pichai, A Cyber Relic, A Mentor.
Sundar Pichai
There’s only one thing that comes to our head when we hear that name, The CEO. But do we really know everything about Pichai? How did Pichai Sundararajan went on to become the tycoon coming from a working-class family? Yes, let’s start from here, his father, Regunatha Pichai, an Electrical engineer, worked in as an electrical designer for the British aggregate GEC and dealt with an industrial facility that made electrical segments. His mom used to be a transcriber before having kids.
June 10, 1972 the day, an example for today’s young aspiring engineers was born. As a boy growing up in Madras, Pichai slept with his brother in the living room of the cramped family home, but his father made sure that his kids received a good education. Sundararajan was bright from very beginning. At an early age Pichai displayed an interest in technology and an extraordinary memory, especially for telephone numbers. He never forgot the phone number he dialed just once. With his abilities, good at studies, he completed his preliminary education from Padma Seshadri Bala Bhavan. Went on to do engineering from IIT Kharagpur in Metallurgy (Batch of 1993) . Yes, that’s an example for the aspiring engineers of the future who have questions lurking at the corner of their heads. He has always said “ It is important to follow your dreams and heart. Do something that excites you.”
Matter of fact, very less people know that he still has skype sessions with the students of IIT Kharagpur to keep them motivated.
Right after Kharagpur, after securing a silver medal he was awarded a scholarship to study at Stanford University (M.S. in engineering and materials science, 1995). He stood out there as well, and decided to stay in the US working briefly for Applied Materials (a supplier of semiconductor materials). Then later earning an M.B.A. (2002) from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. So far so good, every young mind reading this right now must be thinking, what answers did we get so far? The answers are hidden in the words of the person himself.
“ I have a secret project which adds four hours every day to the 24 hours we have. There’s a bit of time travel involved. Keep pushing your limits. “ — Sundar Pichai
Following a short stint at the management consulting firm McKinsey & Co., Pichai joined Google in 2004 as the head of product management and development. He did not become the CEO directly ofcourse, here’s where the story begins of him becoming a regular employee and then the CEO of the world’s largest company. He initially worked on the most useful tool of Google, that we see, everyday, use it, but still never notice. The Google toolbar. This enabled those using the Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox Web browsers to easily access the Google search engine. That’s how major his contribution was to Google. Over the next few years, he was directly involved in the development of Google’s own browser, Chrome (as we all know) which was released to the public in 2008. As well as being largely responsible for Google Drive. He went on to oversee the development of other applications such as Gmail and Google Maps. Now you know, when it all was introduced to you, a bright Indian mind was working on it day and night.
“ India has long been an exporter of talent to tech companies… But it is India that’s now undergoing its own revolution.” — Sundar Pichai
Think about what he said as you read it. On November 19, 2009, Pichai gave a demonstration of Chrome OS, the Chromebook was released for trial and testing in 2011, and released to the public in 2012. On May 20, 2010, he announced the open-sourcing of the new video codec VP8 by Google and introduced the new video format, WebM. Basically everything we know about Google and use, has Pichai’s vision involved. Even Android, On March 13, 2013, Pichai added Android to the list of Google products that he oversaw. Android was formerly managed by Andy Rubin. A breakthrough, and Pichai was selected to become the next CEO of Google on August 10, 2015 after previously being appointed Product Chief by CEO, Larry Page. On October 24, 2015 he stepped into the new position at the completion of the formation of Alphabet Inc., the new holding company for the Google company family. He basically became the CEO of the mother company of Google LLC and eventually Larry stepped down from the post of Google and Pichai became the CEO that very moment.
“As a leader, It is important to not just see your own success, but focus on the success of others.” -Sundar Pichai
I believe, this attitude of his got him the well deserved designation not just in the company, but in the whole world. In 2011 Pichai reportedly was aggressively pursued for employment by microblogging service Twitter, and in 2014 he was touted as a possible CEO for Microsoft, but in both instances he was granted large financial packages to remain with Google. Apparently, Microsoft appointed Satya Nadella as their CEO, who is an Indian aswell.
All the questions, an engineer at this point of time is confused with, must notice that biggest companies in the business have their CEOs of Indian origin. We just had a look at one of their lives.
Pichai once said, “ There are many powerful men and women in mobile. I’m fortunate to be part of that group. But by no means do I think I’m the most powerful person.”
Today, Mr. Sundararajan Pichai earns 5.42 Crores per day and has an overall annual package of 2154 Crores a year. This is the total Google pays him for his sheer talent. And every little contribution that he has given towards Google which made it a lifestyle of billions of people around the globe.
On his birthday, there’s no better way to pay our respect to him and his contribution, than using his life examples to motivate every aspiring mind, and technology student who is feeling unguided with what they want to pursue in their future.
“ Don’t Just reply for the heck of replying. Try to solve the problem. Don’t react, Just respond. “
After becoming the CEO he, once quoted “ While studying at Stanford,I got a dedicated computer for the first time in my life.That was a big moment in my life. “
This gets us to a moment of realisation, of how he responded to his past situations, with his current achievements. Being humble, innovative, intelligent and an extreme team player.
“Wear your failure as a badge of honour!” — Sundar Pichai
Art Ho!
Written by Harsh Srivastava
