India-born Sundar Pichai has been named CEO of Google after formation of a new parent company called Alphabet Inc.
Pichai, 43, the current company vice-president, has worked on some of the company’s best-known products, from the Chrome browser to the Android mobile software.
Google chief executive Larry Page announced the change, saying he will hold the same title at Alphabet. Co-founder Sergey Brin will be the president at Alphabet, the new holding company for the tech giant’s newer ventures such as research arm X Lab, investment unit Google Ventures and health and science operations.
About Sundar Pichai
- Full Name: Pichai Sundararajan, better known as Sundar Pichai
- He is a technology executive who is Product Chief at Google Inc.
- Pichai was announced as the next CEO of Google on 10 August 2024
Early Life
- Pichai was born in Madras, India in 1972.
- His father Raghunath Pichai was an electrical engineer for the British conglomerate GEC and managed a factory that made electrical components.
- Pichai grew up in Chennai.
Educational Background
- Pichai earned his degree from Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur (IIT KGP) in Metallurgical Engineering.
- He holds an MS from Stanford University in Material Sciences and Engineering and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
- He worked in engineering and product management at Applied Materials and in management consulting at McKinsey & Company.
Career at Google
- Pichai joined Google in 2004
- At Google he led the product management and innovation efforts for a suite of Google’s client software products, including Google Chrome and Chrome OS, as well as being largely responsible for Google Drive.
- He went on to oversee the development of different apps like Gmail and Google Maps.
- On 19 November 2009, Pichai gave a demonstration of Chrome OS and the Chromebook was released for trial and testing in 2011 and released in public in 2012.
- On 20 May 2010, he announced the open-sourcing of the new video codec VP8 by Google, and introduced the new video format WebM.
- On 13 March 2013, Pichai added Android to the Google products he oversees. Android was formerly managed by Andy Rubin. He was rumored to be one of the contenders for the CEO position of Microsoft in 2014.
- He was a Director of Jive Software from April 2011 to 30 July 2013.
CEO of Google
- Pichai was announced as the CEO of Google on 10 August 2024 after previously being appointed Product Chief by current CEO Larry Page on 24 October 2014.
- He will step into the new position upon the completion of the formation of Alphabet Inc., the new conglomerate for the Google company family.