A Journey from Madras to the CEO of GOOGLE

The era we are living is considered to be an era of technology and information. And today information’s are just at the distant of pressing a key. From all the internet-based search engines’, google is the most used one. It is basically an American multinational technology company which provides internet-based services and products including with a search engine, online advertisement technologies, cloud computing, software and hardware for our daily use. And the CEO of this immensely popular company as well as one of the most important personalities in the world is an Indian-born named Sundar Pichai. Since 10 August 2015, he became very famous because on this date, he was announced to be the new CEO of Google. Formerly, he was the Product Chief of Google. And now he is the CEO of both Google and its holding company Alphabet Inc.

Sundar Pichai, full name Pichai Sundararajan is from Madras (now Chennai), Tamil Nadu, India. He comes from a respectable family in Tamil Nadu. Born in a middle-class home, Pichai has now become a globally recognized figure leading the steering wheels of the world’s most influential tech company. But the questions arise as how did he climb his way up to the top of this tech gen and most importantly, the role he has been playing this whole time to shape the future of the tech world we so dearly depend on?

To answer this question, we have to dive deep into the ocean of Sundar Pichai's extraordinary life. His father Regunatha Pichai, an electrical engineer at the British multinational GEC always made sure Pichai received a good education. His family lived in a two-room apartment, and Sundar and his younger brother had to sleep in the living room. Yet, it never stopped Sundar from developing his love for technology. From his childhood, he had an interest in technology and an extraordinary memory, especially for telephone numbers as this tech titan didn't have a telephone in his house till he was 12. After earning a degree in metallurgy (B.Tech., 1993) and a silver medal at the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, he was awarded a scholarship to study at Stanford University (M.S. in engineering and materials science, 1995). Then he settled down in the United States thereafter and started working briefly for Applied Materials and earning an M.B.A. (2002) from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Pichai joined Google in 2004 as the head of product management and development. In the beginning he worked on the Google Toolbar, which enabled those using the Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox Web browsers to easily access the Google search engine. After some years, he was involved in the development of Google’s own browser, Chrome, which was released to the public in 2008, which was the first big achievement of his upcoming blast of a career. That same year he was named vice president of product development. After that he was all set to make huge progress. By 2012 he was a senior vice president, and two years later he was made product chief over both Google and the Android smartphone operating system.

His vision includes the transition of Google from a “mobile-first” to an “AI-first” company. Products like Google Assistant, Google Home, and AI-powered enhancements in Google Search and Maps have already been visualizing his vision. Sundar Pichai sees AI not as a separate product but a fundamental, underlying technology that will drive all of Google’s offerings.

“You might fail a few times, but that’s Ok. you end up doing something worthwhile which you learn a great deal from.” ― Sundar Pichai

Pichai's journey tells us a tale where the city or the country you're from never hinders the path of your success if you have the dedication and hard work to meet up your destined goal. Sundar Pichai started his journey in a small apartment of Madras but now he lives in a house worth 8 million dollars and his net worth is 1.74 billion dollars.