Why global tech giants turn to Indian talent

Why global tech giants turn to Indian talent

MUMBAI: Twitter’s new CEO Parag Agrawal is the latest alumnus of India’s prestigious technical universities appointed to head a multi-billion-dollar US tech firm, and Shivani Nandgaonkar wants to follow in his footsteps. The 22-year-old student at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay — Agrawal’s alma mater-has already been recruited by Google to become one of the thousands of IIT graduates at major American tech companies.

“When I heard about Parag, I was so happy,” she said. “One IITian is also CEO of Google, Sundar Pichai. So this is my (stepping) stone now.” Twitter’s Agrawal is the youngest chief executive in the S&P 500 at just 37. Like Google-parent Alphabet’s 49-year-old CEO Sundar Pichai, he left India after his IIT degree to pursue a postgrad in the United States before working at several American companies.

Other Indians at the highest corporate tech echelons include IBM’s Arvind Krishna and Palo Alto Networks’ Nikesh Arora-both IIT alumni-along with Satya Nadella of Microsoft and Shantanu Narayen at Adobe. Executives and experts say that beyond the South Asian nation’s sheer size, the phenomenon is due to multiple push-pull factors and skillsets including a culture of problem-solving, the English language, and relentless hard work.

IIT graduate and Sun Microsystems