Mohan succeeds Susan Wojcicki, one of the early employees of Google. The search giant in its early days functioned out of Wojcicki’s garage. An Indian-American executive and a close aide of Wojcicki for 15 years, Mohan has been the chief product officer at YouTube since 2015. He had earlier had a stint with Google which he joined in 2008.
A Stanford graduate, Mohan has also worked with Microsoft as a manager in corporate strategy. He had previously worked at DoubleClick, an online advertising company that was acquired by Google in 2007.
Mohan is recognized for his expertise in digital advertising and has also been credited with playing a key role in the development of several of Google’s advertising products, including AdWords, AdSense, and DoubleClick. Wojcicki in her letter to employees announcing her exit said Neal has set up a top-notch product and UX team and played pivotal roles in the launch of YouTube TV, YouTube Music and Premium and Shorts.
Today, there are many Indian-origin CEOs at the helm of global tech companies. Search giant Google’s parent Alphabet is led by Madurai-born Sundar Pichai. An IIT Kharagpur alumnus, he was appointed Google CEO in August 2015. Pichai was only the third chief executive of the company after former CEO Eric Schmidt and cofounder Larry Page. Four years later, in December 2019, he became the CEO of Alphabet.
Another Indian-American business executive Satya Nadella occupies the corner office at Microsoft. He succeeded Steve Ballmer as CEO of Microsoft in 2014 and has since been at the centre of the turnaround at the company.
Thomas Kurian of Google Cloud, Ravi Kumar S of Cognizant, Arvind Krishna of IBM, Nikesh Arora of Palo Alto Networks and Shantanu Narayen of Adobe are some of the other prominent Indian-origin CEOs of global tech companies.
Neal Mohan succeeds Wojcicki as YouTube CEO: YouTube chief executive officer Susan Wojcicki will be stepping down from her role after serving at the helm of Alphabet’s video streaming platform for the last nine years. Wojcicki will be replaced by Indian American Neal Mohan.
Who is Neal Mohan, the new Indian American CEO of YouTube? Neal Mohan has been serving as the chief product officer for YouTube since 2015. Mohan had also worked with Google, which he joined in 2008.
Mohan assumes charge at a critical time: Mohan’s elevation comes at a critical juncture in the video-streaming platform’s history as it faces stiff competition from ByteDance-owned TikTok and Facebook-owned Instagram in the short-duration video segment.
ETtech Exclusives
New-age investment firms to approach CBDT on hike in TCS: New-age stock investment platforms may write to the government requesting it to exempt the proposed 20% levy on foreign remittances under the Liberalised Remittance Scheme (LRS) for retail investors investing in US equity instruments, and restrict the new regime only to high-net individuals and high-value transactions. Stock investment platforms such as IndMoney, Vested Finance and Stockal, among others, think the proposed increase in TCS on such transactions will deal a blow to the wealth management industry and hurt retail investors.
Reliance JioMart shuts quick delivery service Express within a year: Reliance Retail’s JioMart has quietly paused the operations of JioMart Express, the quick commerce grocery delivery service it launched in March last year, people aware of the matter said. Users are directed to try JioMart on WhatsApp where deliveries take a few hours minimum or it may even take a day as opposed to JioMart Express, which was a 90-minute delivery service.
GoMechanic founders had a ‘spare’ plan to stay on track: About three to four months before GoMechanic’s founders confessed that the company’s growth was riddled with financial lapses and laid off 70% of the staff in the face of potential bankruptcy, the Gurugram-based company was powering through a different plan–spin off the spare parts business and raise capital.
CCI may soon take a bite out of Apple: The Competition Commission of India (CCI) is close to completing its investigation into the app store and billing policies of iPhone maker Apple, several people aware of the development told ET.
IT Updates
Amid ChatGPT buzz, IT firms add courses in generative AI: Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, along with global tech consultants such as Accenture are including training and skilling modules for beginners on ChatGPT and similar artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.
BPM companies turn to cost-saving deals in new normal: Business process management (BPM) firms are bagging more cost-saving deals as clients prioritise on cost-cutting and beating inflation.
IT service clients eye shorter budget cycles: Faced with macroeconomic headwinds, enterprise clients are communicating shorter budget cycles to IT services providers to make sure projects are completed with clear end points and strict timelines, industry experts said.
Startups In News
ETtech Interview | Traditional sectors drive growth for Postman, says Abhinav Asthana: Postman, an Application Programming Interface (API) management platform for enterprises, is witnessing an uptick in usage from traditional sectors such as banking, retail, ad-tech and automotive industries, its chief executive Abhinav Asthana told ET. The most valued Indian SaaS startup at $5.6 billion, Postman has partnered with companies like Axis Bank and Disney Hotstar in the domestic market, helping them reduce shipping time for new API products, allowing fresh integrations, and driving efficiencies. Read the full interview here.
PharmEasy rules out Thyrocare sale: PharmEasy’s founders told the Board earlier this month they will not sell its diagnostic business Thyrocare, people familiar with the matter told ET. The move comes amid the e-pharmacy’s struggles to raise fresh funds because of a broader tech downturn. PharmEasy’s parent API Holdings has also delayed internal plans for a potential initial public offering (IPO) to 2025. PharmEasy’s cash runway has shrunk to about a year, based on its December burn rate.
Funding, M&As
B2B startups cornered $8.5B in eight years, says Matrix report: Indian B2B startups have cornered over $8.5 billion in equity funding from investors across 500 funding rounds since 2015, according to venture capital firm Matrix Partners India.
PhonePe lands $100-million top-up at $12-billion valuation: Digital payments firm PhonePe has raised another $100 million in primary funding from fintech backer Ribbit Capital, TVS Capital Funds (TCF) and New York-based investment firm Tiger Global at a pre-money valuation of $12 billion.
InsuranceDekho raises $150 million: Insurtech platform InsuranceDekho has raised $150 million in a mix of equity and debt funding, led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management and TVS Capital Fund.
ETtech Deals Digest | Funding for startups nosedives 72% YoY: During the week of February 11-17, venture funding in local startups saw a slight decline even as PhonePe and InsuranceDekho emerged as exceptions to the broader trend.
Other Top Stories
32 entities given in-principle approval for payment aggregator licence: Payment arms of US technology majors Amazon and Google, along with Reliance Payment Solutions, that is part of Reliance Jio Infocomm, were among the 32 firms given in-principle approval from the Reserve Bank of India on Wednesday to operate as online payment aggregators.
In 2022, etailers trumped offline stores in smartphone shipments: Online platforms led by Flipkart and Amazon in 2022 overtook offline retailers in annual shipments of smartphones for the first time when both channels were operating in their normal capacity, unmarred by lockdowns.
Reliance launches ecommerce beauty platform Tira: Reliance Retail on Tuesday launched an online beauty platform, Tira, heating up competition within the rapidly growing beauty ecommerce space led by Nykaa, new entrant Tata Cliq Palette, and others like Sephora, SS Beauty by Shopper’s Stop and Myntra.
Fortnite-maker Epic Games moves NCLAT against Google: Global gaming giant Epic Games has moved the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal alleging that Google had failed to comply with several directions by India’s antitrust regulator.
Underlying demand for beauty, fashion strong, says Falguni Nayar: FSN E-Commerce Ventures, the parent of omnichannel beauty and fashion retailer Nykaa, has announced a significant drop in its consolidated net profit. Following the results announcement, Falguni Nayar said the underlying demand for beauty, fashion is ”very strong”.
(Graphics and illustrations by Rahul Awasthi)
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