FOBs and ABCDs:
Pichai and other Indian-born individuals in Silicon Valley are often referred to as "FOBs" (Fresh Off the Boat) by American-born Indians. FOBs return the "affection" by calling American-born Indians "ABCDs" (American Born Confused Desis). For those unfamiliar with the Indian vernacular, Pichai's first name Sundar means beautiful. All joking aside, it's a matter of great pride and joy to Indians and other immigrants for one of their own to be picked to head an iconic Silicon Valley tech giant.
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| Google Revenue Growth Slowing |
Google Revenue Growth:
While Google continues to generate billions of dollars in cash, its revenue growth is clearly slowing. Google's revenue growth has halved in a year-- from 22% annual growth in Q2/2014 to 11% in Q2/2015. The trend is clear: High growth can not be sustained as new social media competitors like Facebook and Twitter grow to target the same ad market.
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| Boston Consulting Group's Market Share vs Growth Matrix |
Cash Cow Management:
It seems that Google founders Brin and Page have decided to delegate the tending of the cash cow called Google to Pichai. This will free up the founding duo to focus on investing in new ideas to grow other large high-growth tech businesses in the future as Google's ad revenue growth continues to decline. It's a well-known concept first documented by Boston Consulting Group in a matrix with four quadrants: Stars, Dogs, Cash Cows and Question Marks.
Difficult Transition:
Other high-growth tech companies have found this transition from a cash-cow to new high-growth products very difficult. Apple did well with the PC business but almost failed with its decline until Steve Jobs returned with iPod, iPhone and Tablets to reclaim its high-growth trajectory. Intel and Microsoft continue to struggle since the growth of Wintel PCs flattened. It will be a big test for Google founders to manage this major transition.
Summary:
Major reorganization announced by Google today is a recognition of the difficult transition its founders face. With all its talent, Google probably has as good a chance as any tech company to meet this challenge head-on. Brin and Page must continue to focus on hiring and retaining the top talent to pull it off.
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10 comments:
Well, sir, you must be very proud of Mr. Pichhai and you would have good reason to be. You were one of the pioneers from the subcontinent in the IT industry and without folks like you, Mr. Pichhai success would not have been possible!
Regards
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-33861128
Excerpts from New York Times Sept 2013 when Microsoft picked Satya Nadella:
“It is very hard to be a broad-based tech conglomerate,” said David Yoffie, a professor at the Harvard Business School.
“It makes it harder to manage, which is a challenge for Microsoft (applies to Google as well) no matter who the successor is,” said Mr. Yoffie. Long before Mr. Ballmer announced his retirement, he and Bill Gates, the Microsoft chairman and co-founder, had both quietly acknowledged that identifying a new leader for Microsoft would be hard. A person who spoke to Mr. Gates several years ago on the subject of succession recalls the Microsoft chairman saying he would support replacing Mr. Ballmer if he could think of someone who could do a better job.
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Mr. Sherlund has speculated that Microsoft could give Facebook, with which Microsoft has an existing partnership, control of Bing, in exchange for a share of revenue from the additional traffic it would drive to Facebook’s site. Mr. Sherlund estimates that Microsoft has accumulated losses of more than $17 billion in the search and online business.
Still, while it has sold off or spun out smaller businesses in the past — the travel site Expedia originated at the company in the late ’90s — Microsoft has shown no interest in jettisoning major products.
In its defense, Microsoft notes that its long line of products yields many synergies. Xbox uses a variation of the Windows operating system, while Bing provides search services that are tightly integrated with Windows, Xbox and the Windows Phone mobile operating system.
Further, it could be argued that Microsoft’s competitors are recognizing that, like Microsoft, they need to develop products in areas once considered outside their expertise. Google bought Motorola Mobility to help it get into the hardware business. Apple has been on a start-up acquisition binge to improve its online mapping service. And Amazon, once entirely focused on consumers, has become an important supplier of cloud services to businesses.
Even with those changes, Mr. Yoffie of Harvard said Microsoft’s big rivals are still more focused than it is. “I think the fundamental question for the next C.E.O. of Microsoft,” he said, “is, what is his vision of Microsoft?”
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/09/technology/worries-that-microsoft-is-growing-too-tricky-to-manage.html?_r=0
Why Brahmins lead Western firms but rarely Indian ones
https://www.economist.com/asia/2022/01/01/why-brahmins-lead-western-firms-but-rarely-indian-ones
what do the chief executives of Adobe, Alphabet, ibm, Match Group (which owns Tinder), Microsoft, OnlyFans (a subscription service featuring content creators in various stages of undress) and Twitter have in common? All seven happen to be of Indian origin. That is not surprising considering the abundance of subcontinental talent drifting into Western companies: in recent years Indians have been granted well over two-thirds of America’s h-1b visas for highly skilled workers.
But these particular bosses share something else, too. They are all top-caste Hindus. Four are Brahmins. Traditionally associated with the priesthood and learning, this pinnacle of the caste pyramid’s 25,000-plus sub-groups makes up just 50m or so of India’s 1.4bn people. The other three ceos come from castes traditionally associated with commerce or “scribal” professions such as book-keeping. These groups account for a similarly slim section of the pyramid’s capstone: the 30% of Hindus that the government classes as “forward” castes, as opposed to the 70% who fall among such categories as “backward” or “scheduled” castes (Dalits, formerly known as untouchables) and “scheduled tribes”
Dalit Diva
@dalitdiva
(Thenmozhi Soundarajan)
In the grand silicon valley tradition of white cismen passing the torch to Brahmin cismen Jack Dorsey is stepping down and Parag Agarwal is the new CEO of Twitter. Will he also remain silent about Caste? #casteintech
https://twitter.com/dalitdiva/status/1465358123640655875?s=20
Remember Microsoft went from Steve Ballmer to Satya Nadella & Alphabet from Larry Page to Sundar Pinchai. These companies still have caste discrimination while having leadership that is racially diverse but caste priviliged. DEI is the need of the hour. #Casteintech
https://twitter.com/dalitdiva/status/1465358125616152581?s=20
#India's #IIT professor says 'ghosts exist', claims to have driven out 'evil spirits' via chants. Behera teaches Electrical Engineering. He has a PhD from IIT #Delhi. His specialities include #robotics and Artificial Intelligence (#AI) #Hindutva #BJP #Modi https://www.timesnownews.com/the-buzz/article/iit-mandi-director-prof-laxmidhar-behera-says-ghosts-exist-claims-to-have-driven-out-evil-spirits-via-chants/849746
KEY HIGHLIGHTSProfessor Laxmidhar Behera, Director of IIT Mandi, said that "ghosts exists"In a video, he claimed that he went to Chennai in 1993 to drive out "evil spirits" from his friend's house and familyHe said that he chanted holy mantras in his apparent act of exorcism
A video of the newly appointed Director of IIT Mandi, Professor Laxmidhar Behera, talking about his apparent act of exorcism to get rid of "evil spirits" from his friend's house by chanting holy mantras has surfaced online.
In the five-minute video, Behera recalled the 1993 incident when he travelled to Chennai to help a friend who was in distress as his "family was affected by ghosts".
The professor said that he had started "practising the thoughts and wisdom in the Bhagavad Gita" along with chanting the 'Hare Rama Hare Krishna' mantra. He said that he had decided to help his friend to "demonstrate the potency of the holy name", The Indian Express reported.
"So I took two of my friends and reached at 7 pm. He was in a research scholar apartment. After 10-15 minutes of loud chanting, we suddenly saw his father, who was a very short... person, absolutely old, barely able to walk, and suddenly his hand and leg was... he was creating such a ghastly dance and his head is almost touching the roof. You could feel that he is being completely devoured by the evil spirit," Behera said in the video.
He added that the mother and wife of the friend were later "possessed by the evil spirit'. It took them around "45 minutes to an hour" of loud chanting to ward off the "evil spirit", he said.
The video was posted seven months ago on a YouTube channel named "Learn Gita Live Gita". The tagline of the channel is "Project by IITIANS who live Gita."
Behera told IE, "I narrated what I said. Ghosts exist, yes."
Behera is a professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering. He has done PhD from IIT Delhi and his areas of speciality are robotics and Artificial Intelligence.
Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy says IITs have become victims to rote learning due to coaching classes
https://www.timesnownews.com/business-economy/companies/infosys-founder-nr-narayana-murthy-says-iits-have-become-victims-to-rote-learning-due-to-coaching-classes-article-95545869
As more and more students leave India for higher studies, Infosys founder Narayana Murthy proposed that governments and corporates should “incentivise” researchers with grants and provide facilities to work here. “The 10,000 crore per year grants for universities under the New Education Policy will help institutions become competitive", he said.
https://youtu.be/2vzSwExIoNg
Infosys founder NR Narayana Murthy on Tuesday expressed concern over India’s education system saying that even the IITs are becoming a victim of learning by rote due to the “tyranny of coaching classes.” Murthy suggested that our education system needs a reorientation directed towards Socratic questioning.
The Infosys founder, who himself is an IIT alumnus, batted for Socratic questioning in the classroom in order to arrive at solutions to real-world issues. “Many experts feel that (in) our country, (there is an) inability to use research to solve our immediate pressing problems around us… (this) is due to lack of inculcating curiosity at an early age, disconnect between pure or applied research," he said.
As to what could be done to solve this, the 76-year-old suggested that the first component is to reorient teaching in schools and colleges towards Socratic questioning in the classroom to solve real-world problems rather than passing the examinations by rote learning. Socrates was a fifth century (BCE) Greek philosopher credited as the founder of Western philosophy.
Speaking at the 14th edition of the Infosys Prize event in Bengaluru, Murthy said that the nation’s progress on the economic and social front depends on the quality of scientific and technological research. Research thrives in an environment of honour and respect for intellectuals, meritocracy and the support and approbation of such intellectuals from society, he noted.
Neither Indian nor Pakistani universities make the top 100 world rankings.
All Indian-American CEOs here have studied in the US and earned advanced degrees in America without which they wouldn't advance.
I bet these CEOs are a lot more rational than most of the Indian grads from IIT or anywhere else in India.
These CEOs wouldn't make it to the top in America if they spewed the kind of hate and bigotry that is the norm in India.
India is about to surpass China as the world's most populous country.
India has overtaken China in terms of the US F-1 student visas issued.
Graduate programs in STEM and business fields at US universities are dominated by Indian and Chinese students.
100,000 Indians and 56,000 Chinese students have been issued US F-1 visa in 2022.
Most Chinese students go back to China while the vast majority of Indian students stay in the US for employment after graduation.
So it makes sense that some of the top Indian students graduating from US universities rise to become CEOs of tech companies.
Hiring for top positions occurs mostly from within the company.
People like Parag Aggarwal, Satya Nadella and Sundar Pichai rose to these positions after working at Twitter, Microsoft and Google for many years.
All of them came to the US to study before being hired to work at these tech companies.
The probability of such promotions is a lot higher if there are lots of Indians coming out of US grad schools and working for these companies.
Currently, there are 199,182 Indian students and just 8,772 Pakistani students enrolled in US universities.
https://opendoorsdata.org/data/international-students/leading-places-of-origin/
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