Sundar Pichai, who has been promoted as the CEO of Google, quickly moved up the ranks at the company after joining in 2004. The search engine giant on Monday announced the Indian as its chief executive to oversee core search and advertisement business.
Born in 1972 in Chennai, the capital city of Tamil Nadu, Pichai did his bachelor's degree in metallurgical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur. After completing his graduation, he pursued an M.S. at Stanford University in Material Sciences and Engineering. Later, he studied MBA at Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Pichai started his career with Applied Materials working in its engineering and product management division before moving to management consulting firm McKinsey & Company.
After joining as a 'low key manager ' in Google in 2004, Pichai moved up to top ranks at the company following the successful launch of operating system Google Chrome in 2008. He also led the launch of Gmail and Google Maps. In 2012, Google's Chrome emerged as the world's top browser dethroning the position held by Microsoft's Internet Explorer for years.
Following the success of Chrome, Google appointed Pichai as the head of its mobile operating system Android in 2013. Later, he was promoted to product chief in October 2014, which "literally made him Google co-founder and CEO Larry Page's second-in-command with oversight of day-to-day operations for all of Google's major products including maps, search, and advertising."
Last year, a media report said that Microsoft was considering Pichai for the top post before it finalised Indian-origin Satya Nadella as the new CEO replacing Steve Ballmer.
"Pichai was doing work in the field of electronics at a time when no separate course on electronics existed in our curriculum," said one of his colleagues at Google.
Google also announced formation of a parent company Alphabet. Under the new structure, Google will become a subsidiary of Alphabet led by Pichai. He will now handle search business, YouTube, Android, Chrome, Apps, Maps and Ads of Google, switching from a role of senior vice president of products and engineering team at the company.
