New Delhi: The resignation of Nikesh Arora, president and COO of SoftBank, came as a surprise to the entire world. Arora, who was just cleared of allegations of irregularities by the company’s board a day before he announced his decision, was one of the highest paid executives across the globe and the heir apparent to the Japanese telecom and investment giant.
The decision came over differences over Masayoshi Son, the CEO of SoftBank, handing over the reins of the company to Arora. Arora quit saying he did not wish to be a “CEO-in-waiting” past his “sell-by date”. Son, who had announced his intent to make way for Arora to take over when he turned 60, decided otherwise.
Nikesh Arora, 48, was born in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh and completed his schooling from the Air Force School in Delhi. He graduated as an electronic engineer from IIT BHU in 1989. Arora also holds a MS degree from Boston College and an MBA from Northeastern University, and was awarded with distinction in both the places.
In 2004, a 'small company' (at the time) called Google approached Arora to manage their European business. Arora took the job and served the company from 2004 to 2007. He also has a great role in the success of the search engine giant where he ran Google's European operations and later Middle East and African markets. He became Chief Business Officer of Google in 2011.
According to Fortune, Arora was responsible for Google's entire $29 billion (Rs. 195 cr approx.) in revenue. In 2013, Arora delivered the opening speech in front of almost 14,000 Google employees at a conference in California. In 2012, he was reported to be Google’s highest paid executive raking in $44 million (Rs 264 cr approx.).
Bloomberg Businessweek reported that Arora remained Google's highest paid executive in 2013 drawing a package of $57.1 million (Rs 344 cr approx), which stood at around Rs 1 crore per day in 2013.
Arora left Google in July 2014, resigning from the post of senior vice president and chief business officer to join Japanese Conglomerate Softbank as president and chief operating officer. He was paid a salary of $73 million (Rs 488 cr approx.) in 2015-2016, according to Bloomberg.
This made him the highest paid India-born executive, beating Satya Nadella of Microsoft and PepsiCo chief Indra Nooyi. In the previous fiscal year, he received $135 million (Rs 850 cr approx.) pay package including a joining bonus.
Apart from all this, Nikesh is also a keen golfer and a cult-figure among Indian techies. Like every other India he loves eating Indian food at home and is an avid cricket follower.
Arora married Delhi businesswoman Ayesha Thapar in 2014 in Italy at a lavish multi-day ceremony. For both, Ayesha and Nikesh, it was second marriage. Ayesha was married to Miami based Turkish telecom tycoon earlier and Nikesh was married to Kiran with whom he has a daughter.
With Arora at the helm, SoftBank had made significant investments into India through the years and his exit has given rise to speculation over the possible impact on these investments. Softbank has been big investors in India and have invested in Ola, Snapdeal, Oyo Rooms, Housing.com, among others.
In 2014, Softbank invested $210 million (Rs. 1400 cr approx.) in Ola along with existing shareholders, $627 million (Rs. 4200 cr approx.) in Snapdeal and $90 million (Rs. 600 cr approx.) in Housing.com along with existing shareholders such as Falcon Edge. In 2015, the company invested $120 million (Rs. 800 cr approx) in Grofers, $100 million (Rs. 674 cr approx.) in Oyo Room along with other investors.
In all, SoftBank’s investments are pegged at around $85 billion (Rs. 573 cr approx.).
