S. Gopalakrishnan:

Senapathy Gopalakrishnan was born on 5th April 1956 in Trivandrum, Kerala, to a lower middle class family. Poor financial conditions forced him to abandon studies when he was 18 years old and at that tender age, he started a small plumbing business. But his hunger to study did not perish and was very keen to study further. He fell short by two marks in the medical entrance exam.
Later he earned both M.Sc in Physics and M.Tech in Computer Science, from Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.
Despite offers from large business conglomerates during campus placements, Gopalakrishnan opted for a little known Patni Computer Systems based in Mumbai, where he became a part of the center team.
Three years later, Gopalakrishnan made an unusual choice of starting a start-up company called the Infosys. In his early years at Infosys, he looked after the development, implementation, management of design, and support of information systems for the clients.

Sabeer Bhatia:
Sabeer Bhatia, the pioneer of web-based email, was born on 30th December 1968 in Chandigarh. He has done the unconventional, ever since he decided to study abroad when he was 19 years old. Two years into undergraduate education at the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS), Bhatia qualified for a transfer scholarship at Caltech, which is considered to be the most competitive scholarship in the world. After completing his graduation from Caltech in 1989, he pursued an MS in Electrical Engineering at the Stanford University.

When Bhatia was 27 years old, he was no longer interested in working for others, and together with Jack Smith set up Hotmail on 4th July 1996. So, revolutionary was his idea that Microsoft bought it for an astonishing sum of $400 million after 18 months. Till date, Hotmail remains the largest email provider in the world with over 369 million registered users.

Vikram Pandit:

Vikram Shankar Pandit was born on 14th January 1958 in Nagpur, Maharashtra, to an affluent Marathi Brahmin family. His father was an Executive Director at Sarabhai Chemicals in Baroda.

Vikram Pandit was the youngest Chief Executive Officer of the Citigroup when he took over the company in 2007. He was the first Indian to achieve this feat and the job was regarded as the toughest in the world due to the poor performance of the company. And on October 16, he unexpectedly resigned as the CEO of Citigroup.

Pandit was a brilliant boy in school and he moved to U.S. when he was 16 years old. After completing his B.S. and M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering and MBA from Columbia University, he was determined to get a PhD in a different subject. And his guide recommended him to take up finance, as it was a good field. Pandit followed the suggestion, and switched to finance.

In 1994, Vikram Pandit entered the corporate world, as a head of Morgan Stanley. His technical and administrative skills, along with his ability to make himself indispensable to bosses, fuelled his career and made him the President of Morgan Stanley.

Arun Sarin:

Arun Sarin was born on 21th October 1954 at Panchmari, Madhya Pradesh. He was an academically bright student and was equally good at sports like field hockey, boxing and other extracurricular activities. Sarin wanted to follow his father’s footsteps and join the military to pursue a career as a pilot. But due to his mother’s disapproval, he applied at IIT Kharagpur and was accepted.

In 1975, he graduated with a B.Tech degree in Metallurgical Engineering form IIT Kharagpur with the top 10 percent of his class and received the BC Roy gold medal for his academic brilliance. Sarin then received a full scholarship to the University of California, Berkeley, where he gained M.S. in Engineering and an MBA.

Sarin became the Chief Executive Officer of Vodafone in the year 2003. When he resigned from his post in 2008, Vodafone was the largest mobile phone company in the world in terms of revenue. It was the large market presence of the company in India that propelled Arun Sarin into the limelight. And currently, he serves on the boards of Charles Schwab, Cisco Systems and Safeway, Inc.

 Indra Nooyi:

Indra Nooyi was born on 28th October 1955 in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Nooyi is currently the Chairperson of PepsiCo’s board of directors and is also the highest-ranking Indian-born woman in corporate America. And she attributes much of her success to her upbringing in India.

Indra Nooyi has a Bachelor’s degree in Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics from Madras Christian College in 1974 and a MBA from IIM Calcutta in 1976. She earned a Master’s degree in Public and Private Management from Yale School of Management in 1978. At Yale, she also worked as a receptionist from midnight to 5 a.m. to earn some valuable money.

Nooyi started her career in India. She held different positions at J&J (Johnson & Johnson) and textile firm Mettur Beardsell. In the U.S. she worked with biggies such as Boston Consulting Group (BCG), Motorola and ABB. She joined PepsiCo in 1994, and was named President and CFO in 2001. Nooyi became Chairperson PepsiCo in 2007.

Indra Nooyi is a great example to youngsters, especially women. She has proved to theworld that working mother can climb the corporate ladder while raising kids and be successful in the American corporate environment without sacrificing who we are culturally.

 Nagavara Ramarao Narayan Murthy:

Narayana Murthy was born on 20th August 1946 in Mysore, Karnataka, in a lower middle class Brahmin family. His father was a school teacher who was fond of English literature.

Narayana Murthy was exceptional in studies. Time and again, his seniors in school came to him for solving complex problems. From a very tender age, he had dreams of going to IIT and achieving something big. Hence he worked hard on his academics and was regularly seen studying in the shade of boulders close to the Chamundi hills. Murthy graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the National Institute of Engineering, Mysore, in 1967 and received his Master’s degree from IIT Kanpur in 1969.

Narayana Murthy transformed software industry in India by founding a start-upcompany called the Infosys. This brainchild made him the icon of middle-class dreams and redefined India in the eyes of the world. India was no longer perceived as a third-world, but a rapidly developing nation with unlimited resource and immense talent pool. In the process, he promoted thousands of young creative Indian aspirants to the world and made India a hub of talent.

Narayana Murthy has received several honors and rewards which include JRD Tata Leadership Award for 1996-97, Business India’s Businessman of the Year in 1999, World Entrepreneur of the Year in 2003, Officer of the Legion of Honor in 2008. For his exceptional contribution in promoting the youth of the country, he was also honored with a Padma Vibushan by the Government of India in 2008.