Born on June 10, 1972, to Lakshmi, a stenographer, and Regunatha Pichai, an Electrical Engineer for GEC, Sundarrajan ‘Sunetar’ Pichai has traversed the life of an ordinary middle-class Indian to become one of the most important names in the world of digital advancement. His father saw to it that their kids received a good education.
Better known as Sundar, he attended Jawahar Vidyalaya Senior Secondary School in Chennai and the Vana Vani Matriculation Higher Secondary School within the IIT-Chennai campus. Sundar, at an early age, started displaying an interest in technology and an extraordinary memory, especially for telephone numbers – he still has a knack for recalling telephone numbers that he dialed, a skill that would immensely help him later!
His father owned a manufacturing plant too that produced electrical components and that’s where Sundar got his interest in technology. His father introduced him to technology by sharing stories and challenges that he faced during his workday. His first encounter with technology was when he was 12 – when his father got a telephone connection at home.
After completing his BTech in Metallurgy in 1993 with a silver medal at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur, he was awarded a scholarship for his MS in Engineering and Material Science at Stanford University in 1995. It took him some time to decide and plan his trip to the US, but once he was there, nothing held him back from growing. He dropped out of Stanford to briefly worked with Applied Materials, a Silicon Valley semiconductor manufacturer, and then earned an MBA in 2002 from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
That Dramatic Moment of Change
After a short stint at McKinsey & Co, Sundar joined Google in 2004 as the Head of Product Management and Development, which proved a turning point. He initially worked on the Google Toolbar, which made searching anything on the web easier – Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox Web browsers started to go obsolete thereafter.
Known for his innovative ideas, Sundar is best known as the mastermind behind the launch of the Chrome Browser in 2008. His was an extremely crucial role in convincing his seniors at Google to launch the browser which in time became the most popular browser on the internet and also led to the launch of the Chrome Operating System. “We wanted to take Android and Chrome to every screen that matters for users, which is why we focused on phones, wearables, cars, television, laptops and even workspaces.” That same year, Google made him the Vice President of Product Development and by 2012, he was a Senior Vice President. He believes a leader can only be the one who vouches for the success of others over their own.
He is known to have helped negotiate Google’s $3.2 billion deal to acquire Nest Labs in 2014. Therefore, when Google Co-Founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, announced the creation of Alphabet Inc in August 2015, Sundar was named CEO of Google, which was reorganized as a subsidiary. In December 2019, he also was named CEO of Alphabet.
Memories of Simplicity
“My father,” Sundar says, “spent the equivalent of a year’s salary on my plane ticket to the US so I could attend Stanford. It was my first time on a plane.” The US felt expensive. “A phone call back home was more than $2 a minute, and a backpack cost my dad’s monthly salary.”
Though he has a modestly huge and luxurious villa in the calmest of places in the US, he once lived in simplicity – something that he still basks in. “There was a simplicity to my life; I think the old world was better than today’s world. We lived in a kind of modest house, shared with tenants. We would sleep on the living room floor. There was a drought when I was growing up, and all of us kids had anxiety. It affected me so deeply that I till date never sleep without a bottle of water by my bedside. Every other household had a refrigerator but we didn’t. And then, when my dad got one too, we celebrated like a festival. What seems small today was a big deal once.”
From Long Distance to Forever
Sundar is married to Anjali, whom he met in his initial days at IIT-Kharagpur. They decided to get married during their third year of college. “That was the era of no smartphones. I remember I had once asked her friends to tell Anjali to meet me right outside her hostel. And with her came the entire hostel to see me… I was really embarrassed.” Before leaving for the US, he had promised to return to get married to her. Anjali trusted him; they’d often go without talking to each other as “phone calls were too expensive and I couldn’t afford any”. Once he secured a job, the first opportunity he had to return to India, he did, sought parental permissions, got married to her and brought Anjali with him – to his new world. Anjali is an established chemical engineer and is working as a Business Operation Manager at Intuit, a software company.
“I love my work and all the energy that it exudes but every day, after work, both Anjali and I feel this need to return home and spend time with our daughter, Kavya, and son, Kiran. And yes, can’t forget Jeffree, our pet.”
Sundar loves watching soccer and cricket. He is an avid fan of FC Barcelona and Sachin Tendulkar. As a captain, he led his school cricket team to win several competitions in the region.
Grounded and down-to-earth despite achieving all his goals and living a dream life, he still interacts with the students at IIT-Kharagpur, digitally when needed, and often visits his school and college. “Talking to them is nostalgic to me and they get inspired. So why not!”
Moon Shots
He believes failure is great unless it becomes a habit but it’s very important to recognize when certain things just do not fall into place. “Follow your dreams and do what excites you. Whatever your qualification is, you’d always do good if you follow your heart. But… Always be open to plan B if plan A doesn’t work. At Google, we have an ambitious approach to things we do, we call it moon shots.” For his global work and the way he inspires Indian youth, the Indian government has awarded him with Padma Bhushan, the third-highest civilian award in India.
Sundar believes in an external sense of satisfaction and happiness because of which he always endorses the fact that a person who is happy is not because everything is right in his life, he is happy because his attitude toward everything in his life is right.
Despite the success and fame, Sundar Pichai enjoys, he remains humble and stays connected to his roots. He says, “Dreams do come true if you choose to believe in them.”