How Ghaziabad born engineer became ‘Rising Star’, earning 35 lakhs daily, net worth 8500 crores

story of success: Currently, Nikesh Arora gets the highest salary of any CEO in the world. A highly recognized corporate executive, the Uttar Pradesh native has held key positions in some of the largest corporations across the globe. Once among the top four at Google, he later became the number two employee of SoftBank. Other employers include Wipro, Bharti Airtel, T-Mobile and Deutsche Telekom. He was appointed CEO of cyber security industry leader Palo Alto Networks in 2018 with a record-breaking $128 million (1055.35 crore) remuneration package.

Nikesh Arora: Alumnus of IIT, Varanasi

An Indian-American business leader, Nikesh Arora was born on February 9, 1968. Arora previously held a senior executive position at Google. From October 2014 to June 2016, he chaired SoftBank Group. Arora became the CEO and President of Palo Alto Networks on June 1, 2018. An Electrical Engineering graduate (1989) from the Indian Institute of Technology, BHU, Varanasi, India, Arora was born to an Indian Air Force officer and served in the Air Force. Till the end of his education in 1989 at Force School (Subroto Park). He graduated from Boston College and received his MBA from Northeastern University. His CFA designation dates back to 1999.

Nikesh Arora: The ‘Rising Star’

Nikesh Arora began his career at Fidelity Investments in 1992 and eventually rose to the level of Vice President, Finance, Fidelity Technologies after holding several finance and technology management positions. Born in Ghaziabad, Arora joined Google in 2004. During a ten-year career, Arora rose through the ranks at Google before leaving the business in 2014. A “rising star”. Arora invested in key deals at SoftBank, such as with Ola, Snapdeal and OYO Rooms. Under his leadership, the company invested around $2 billion (164 thousand crores). He became one of the highest paid business leaders in the world at the time, earning $73 million (about ₹601 crore) a year. His initial soft-back salary package actually set a record in Japan.

Nikesh Arora: The Success Story

Under Nikesh, who aspires to make Palo Alto the first $100 billion (8245 thousand crore) cyber security company, the company has grown to unprecedented heights. Under his direction, the business witnessed a market capitalization increase of $27.8 billion (2292 thousand crores) over three years, returned $3.6 billion (296 thousand crores) to shareholders, and achieved record sales of $5.5 billion (453 thousand crores) in FY2022 . During the COVID-19 pandemic, Arora oversaw Palo Alto and decided to give up $1 million (80 million) of his income. Not a single employee was let go by the company.

According to Palo Alto Networks’ financial report, Arora received a total salary of more than $33.5 million over the past two years. As per the average USD-INR conversion rate for July 2021, Nikesh earned a total of $23.28 million in 2021, which is roughly equivalent to Rs 174 crore for the financial year that ended in July that year. Nikesh earns $10.40 million in 2022, which translates to Rs 82.7 crore using the same translation average as of July 2022. In the last two years, Nikesh has received a total compensation of over Rs 256.1 crore, increasing his wealth by over Rs 35 lakh every day. , As per the recent report by IIFL Wealth Hurun India, with a net worth of Rs. 8,500 crores, making him one of the richest CEOs in the world.