In post-independence India, the Tatas, Birlas, and Ambanis were the super rich with their big, diversified, family-owned businesses. The advent of the IT revolution in the nineties and emergence of India as the backoffice of the world brought in a new breed led by Azim Premji, Shiv Nadar, and NR Narayana Murthy of Wipro, HCL, and Infosys.
This year, for the first time, two of India’s tech startup heroes – Binny Bansal and Sachin Bansal, co-founders of ecommerce leader Flipkart – make the cut. In a list of the top 100 billionaires of India put out by Forbes, there are eight tech moguls from India. Here they are, in descending order of billions in net worth:
Azim Premji of Wipro
Net worth: US$15.9 billion
Azim Premji is the founder of IT services company Wipro, one of India’s largest publicly-traded companies. He is third on the overall list of Indian billionaires. Wipro’s market capitalization is around US$35 billion, making it the seventh largest IT services firm in the world. Azim Premji took over the reins of the company after his father’s death in 1966. A 21-year-old then, he was a student at Stanford University in the US. He pivoted the company towards IT and computing in the late seventies. Today, Wipro also has a US$100 million venture capital fund. Azim Premji’s son Rishad heads it.
Shiv Nadar
Net worth: US$12.9 billion
Shiv Nadar is the co-founder of the HCL Group, which owns IT firm HCL Technologies. A publicly-traded IT services company, HCL Technologies has a market capitalization of US$22.1 billion. Recently, Shiv Nadar co-founded a US$500 million fund for startups and healthcare tech companies. He stands sixth on the list of Indian billionaires.
N. R. Narayana Murthy
Net worth: US$1.9 billion
S. Gopalakrishnan
Nandan Nilekani
Binny Bansal and Sachin Bansal
K. Dinesh
Stay updated on the go with our mobile app.
Get latest insights with smoother, more personalized experience through TIA mobile app.
