Sundar Pichai - His Journey From Madurai to California to Becoming the CEO of Google

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Introduction:

                            ‘Alaporan Tamizhan Ulagham Yelamae' 

The above quote means ‘The universe will be ruled by a Tamil. Tamils are destined to win the race.'

From the internet browser to the apps on our mobile phones; everything was founded and is controlled by a Tamilian named Pichai Sundararajan. Better known as Sundar Pichai, he was born into a lower-middle-class family in Madurai but he traveled to California to become the CEO of Google. 

To show you the supremacy of Sundar Pichai's influence and power, let me tell you a short story. 

When Donald Trump became the president of the United States of America he implemented a lot of new rules and regulations. That also included a regulation that stated that citizens of other countries would be sacked from their jobs as the Americans were employed in their own country.

This was a shocker as most of the IT giants had employed a large number of Indians and citizens from other countries. This news took social media by storm and became a hot topic on social media for many weeks.

But then Sundar Pichai brought a ray of hope to all those who staggering with fear by saying, that he was prepared to confront any situation and that his company's job positions and employments would remain unchanged, no matter the verdict that was passed.

The whole world was shocked to see a Tamilian, stand his ground against the president of America to defend the livelihoods of the employees of his company. That my friend is Sundar Pichai! It's not common to find a gem like him!

Background and Education of Sundar Pichai:

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He was born in the year 1972 in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. He is from a lower-middle-class family and grew up in Chennai (Ashok Nagar). At home, he never even had a television. This was how he grew up.

His father was working in a company named GE and his mother worked as a stenographer. She was a housewife following the birth of Sundar Pichai. His family had only one scooter and relied on public transportation to move about for their work. It was only after 12 years, that they got a cell phone.

Sundar Pichai was not a great student or a bad student during his school days. Rather, he was an average student. He also was been bullied by his classmates. But he never took anything to his heart but stayed focused on his interest and purpose.

He was very good at cracking amplitude tests. And so, after 12th-grade exams, he applied for IIT,  and miraculously he cleared the IIT exams and joined IIT Kharagpur,  which is one of India’s biggest engineering institutes. 

It was rather a very different experience for him, as he never moved along with others very easily. There he completed metallurgical engineering, while he also ends up meeting his future spouse Anjali from Rajasthan. In college, Anjali was Sundar's best buddy.

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After he completed his Bachelor's in India, he was offered an opportunity to pursue his Masters at the University of Pennsylvania. The University stated that they would provide him with financial aid for his fees and expenses. As he hailed from a middle-class family, they could not afford his flight ticket and his travel expenses. So his father took a loan and sent Sundar Pichai to America. 

During his stay abroad, he couldn't call and talk to his parents and to Anjali for months as international calls would cost you your bucks. Sundar described it as a period of loneliness, where he felt lonely and cast out for many months.

He faced the issue of racism during his stay in the United States of America. And he felt the heat that he experienced when he was bullied in his school days. After he completed his Higher Studies, he gets a job and he begins to work. 

He then affords to buy a mobile phone and to stay in touch with Anjali and his parents. Anjali later applied for a job in the United States of America, and she gets a job successfully. So she moves to America.

Anjali then encouraged Sundar to join Google, which was a rapidly growing IT company at that time. Sundar applied for a job at Google, and he successfully was employed by the tech giants.

His life you could say slowly began to flow smoothly and later, with the permission of his parents, he married Anjali and took her to be his wife.

His pivotal moment in becoming Google's CEO:

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While he was browsing through the internet, he was struck by the fact that Internet Explorer was the only source of web browsing at that time. So he decided to bring forth Google as a worldwide browser by introducing Google Chrome. Excited with his idea and strategy he took his plan to the CEO(at that time) of Google, but sadly his idea was not really appreciated. 

But Sundar never gave up. He was filled with confidence and made revisions to his plan and idea. And after revising his idea and after all the requirements to develop a web browser were prepared, he presented his idea straight away to the founder of Google; Larry Page. 

Seeing the confidence and the expert knowledge of this candidate, Larry Page accepted the plan of Sundar Pichai and gave clearances to proceed with this idea, by setting up a team of professionals to put into action this idea of Sundar Pichai.

In the course of bringing the plan to action, these ideas and strategies began to spread across and these ideas were leaked. The professionals in the team blamed Sundar for leaking the news and ideas, as it could incur huge losses for the company. But what happens next will shock you!

Sundar came to know that one of his own team members, was the reason for the news to spread and that he was rumor spreader! But having known the culprit, Sundar decided to stay quiet and not blame that person, because he knew that it would cause havoc in that person's life. This shows his genuine character and his pure heart.

Then Sundar officially launched Google Chrome. Although Bill Gates founded the Internet Explorer, Google released a tiny competitor called Google Chrome. And in the span of five years, the majority of individuals began to use Google Chrome. People favored Google Chrome to Internet Explorer. This became a huge success for Sundar Pichai. Anjali was Sundar's backbone and encouraged him in every step to his success story. 

Sundar Pichai then took control of the Android application. With the idea of launching Android all over the world, Sundar Pichai launched Android 1 on most Mobile Devices. Initially, Samsung and some other mobile brands had the Android application. But Sundar Pichai brought Android 1 on all the mobile devices at a very affordable price.

Bill Gates approached Sundar to take over Microsoft and to be its CEO, with a proposed salary package of 1 million dollars per month. But Sundar Pichai declined this offer because he found his success in Google and he wanted to stay loyal to his company.

After knowing that many companies and tech giants were approaching Sundar with attractive salary packages, Larry Page, who initially wanted to declare Sundar as the CEO of Google, officially declared that Sundar was the new CEO of Google. 

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From Madurai to California, this was the amazing journey of Sundar Pichai. Currently, he is the founder and CEO of Alphabet Inc., as well as its subsidiary, Google. Shockingly, some of his teachers at school and college were still not able to recognize him after his surging growth and success.

His self-confidence, his life partner, and his loyalty, in the long run, were the secrets to his success and his recognition. Now we can be proud to be a Tamilian and an Indian because we belong to the race of the CEO of Google!

Written By - Pratthiksha Shree

Edited By - Daniel Deepak Charles