Meet Nikesh Arora: Indian-origin CEO who is second-highest paid in the world

Nikesh Arora is an alumnus of Delhi's Air Force Public School and was also Google's chief business officer.

Palo Alto Networks' CEO Indian-born Nikesh Arora is the second highest paid top boss in the US as per The Wall Street Journal's list. Nikesh Arora's total compensation reached $151.43 million, primarily from stock options, as per the list which also featured other Indian-descent executives among high earners. Among those of Indian-origin, 17 made it into the top 500- Shantanu Narayen of Adobe notably at number 11 with a compensation of $44.93 million.

Indian entrepreneur and former Softbank president Nikesh Arora (L) and Ayesha Thapar arrive at the Tenth Breakthrough Prize Ceremony at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, California.(AFP)

Sanjay Malhotra (Micron Technology), Ajei Gopal (Ansys), and Reshma Kewalramani (Vertex Pharmaceuticals) ranked within the top 120 as per the list. 

Nikesh Arora's salary in comparison to Elon Musk and Sundar Pichai

Other tech giants like Tesla's Elon Musk and Alphabet's Sundar Pichai also opted for non-traditional compensation structures in 2023. Meanwhile, Elon Musk has not received compensation, Sundar Pichai Pichai earned $8.80 million and Mark Zuckerberg of Meta took home $24.40 million, it was reported. 

Who is Nikesh Arora?

Nikesh Arora is an alumnus of Delhi's Air Force Public School and was also Google's chief business officer. He left Google in 2014 and made headlines by leading SoftBank in Japan with a record-breaking compensation package. Since 2018, he's been at cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks.

At the top of the list is Hock Tan of Broadcom with earnings of $162 million.

List highlights other Indian-descent bosses

The report highlighted achievements of Arvind Krishna (IBM), Badrinarayanan Kothandaraman (Enphase Energy), Sanjiv Lamba (Linde), among other Indian-descent leaders.