B.Tech in Electrical Engineering from IIT Madras; Ph.D. from Princeton University.
Systems design engineer at Qualcomm before co-founding the company that became Zoho.
The manufacturing ambition grew from a belief that India should build more of its own deep-tech products, hardware and engineering capability.
Hardware requires capital, supply chains, component ecosystems and much longer development cycles than many software products.
The strategic shift from software-only thinking toward deeper R&D and hardware capability represents the key manufacturing angle.
Built a large independent software company and became a prominent voice for domestic technology capability and rural R&D.
Support deeper Indian capability in hardware, advanced technology, engineering and long-term R&D.
Build technical depth locally and avoid assuming that all high-value technology must be imported.
