Sridhar Vembu (born 1968) is an Indian billionaire business magnate and the founder and

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

Zoho Corporation Zoho Corporation is an Indian Multinational corporation, multinational technology company that makes Software, computer software and Internet, web-based business tools. It is best known for the online office suite offering Zoho Office Suite. T ...

. According to ''Forbes'', he is the 55th richest person in India with a net worth of $3.75 billion, as of 2021. He was awarded India's fourth highest civilian award, the

Padma Shri Padma Shri (IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest Indian honours system, civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, ...

, in 2021.

Early life

Vembu was born in 1968 in a middle class Tamil family from a village in

Thanjavur district Thanjavur District is one of the Districts of Tamil Nadu, 38 districts of the States and territories of India, state of Tamil Nadu, in southeastern India. Its headquarters is Thanjavur. The district is located in the delta of the Cauvery River ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a States and union territories of India, state in southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of India ...

. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in

Electrical Engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

from the

Indian Institute of Technology, Madras Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) is a public technical university located in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. As one of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), it is recognized as an Institute of National Importance and has be ...

in 1989, and earned his MS and PhD degrees from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

Career

Vembu launched his professional career working for

Qualcomm Qualcomm () is an American multinational corporation headquartered in San Diego, California, and incorporated in Delaware. It creates semiconductors, software, and services related to wireless technology. It owns patents critical to the 5G, 4 ...

as a wireless engineer in

San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United States ...

, before moving to the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...

. He has lived in San Jose and Pleasanton. In 1996, Vembu, along with two of his brothers, founded a software development house for

network equipment provider Network equipment providers (NEPs) – sometimes called telecommunications equipment manufacturers (TEMs) – sell products and services to communication service providers such as fixed or mobile operators as well as to enterprise customers. NEP ...

s called AdventNet. The company was renamed

in 2009, focusing on providing

SaaS Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software. SaaS is cons ...

support to

Customer relationship management Customer relationship management (CRM) is a process in which a business or other organization administers its interactions with customers, typically using data analysis to study large amounts of information. CRM systems compile data from a ra ...

services. As of 2020, he held an 88 percent stake in the company. Forbes estimated his net worth at USD $2.44 billion. In 2021, Sridhar Vembu was appointed to

National Security Advisory Board The National Security Council (NSC) (IAST: ''Rāṣṭrīya Surakṣā Pariṣad'') of India is an executive government agency tasked with advising the Prime Minister's Office on matters of national security and strategic interest. It was est ...

Social entrepreneurship

Sridhar Vembu is noted for taking software and product development functions from urban centers into rural villages in India. Specifically, his company, Zoho, established its offices in rural Mathalamparai,

Tenkasi district Tenkasi is one of the 38 districts of Tamil Nadu, India, separated from Tirunelveli district on 22 November 2019. The Government of Tamil Nadu announced its creation on 18 July 2019. The district headquarters is at Tenkasi. Geography The dis ...

and in suburban

Renigunta Renigunta is a neighbourhood and suburb of Tirupati located in Tirupati district of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. Tirupati Airport is located in Renigunta. It is a part of Tirupati urban agglomeration. It is also the mandal headquarters of ...

Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (, abbr. AP) is a state in the south-eastern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state by area covering an area of and tenth-most populous state with 49,386,799 inhabitants. It is bordered by Telangana to the ...

. He moved from the

Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Gov ...

to Mathalamparai at this time. In 2004, he set up Zoho Schools to provide vocational software development education to rural students as an alternative to formal university education. A statement from the company states that 15 to 20 percent of its engineers have no college degree, but have received vocational education from Zoho Schools. In 2020, he announced a "rural school startup" focused on free primary education.

Political views

A former Zoho product marketing manager resigned in October 2018 after a dispute with Vembu over the employee's post on the company's

intranet An intranet is a computer network for sharing information, easier communication, collaboration tools, operational systems, and other computing services within an organization, usually to the exclusion of access by outsiders. The term is used in c ...

discussion forum. The employee stated that Vembu was hostile to him for criticising the

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh ( ; , , ) is an Indian right-wing, Hindu nationalist, paramilitary volunteer organisation. The RSS is the progenitor and leader of a large body of organisations called the Sangh Parivar (Hindi for "Sangh family" ...

(RSS), a

Hindu nationalist Hindu nationalism has been collectively referred to as the expression of social and political thought, based on the native spiritual and cultural traditions of the Indian subcontinent. "Hindu nationalism" or the correct term ''Hindū rāṣṭ ...

paramilitary organisation. In January 2020, Vembu met with criticism after he agreed to attend as the guest of honour, a high-profile event organised by the RSS. Vembu defended his participation as a matter of his personal choice.

Honours

Vembu was awarded the 2019

Ernst & Young Ernst & Young Global Limited, trade name EY, is a multinational professional services partnership headquartered in London, England. EY is one of the largest professional services networks in the world. Along with Deloitte, KPMG and Pricewaterh ...

"Entrepreneur of the Year Award" in India. He was also the recipient of the

, India's fourth highest civilian honor, in 2021. He was also appointed to the

(NSAB) of India in 2021.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vembu, Sridhar 1968 births Living people Indian billionaires Indian founders