Is India on flip side of brain drain?
Parag Agrawal’s appointment as CEO of Twitter sparks off debate over brain drain; However, experts brush it aside saying situation not same with India now as the country catching up with startup ecosystem resulting in brain gain
image for illustrative purpose
Great Indian CEO Virus
- Agrawal, 37, will be the youngest to run a company in the S&P-500 club
- Other India-born CEOs include...
- Arvind Krishna-- IBM
- Sundar Pichai--Google
- Satya Nadella--Microsoft
- Ajay Banga-- Mastercard
- Jayshree V. Ullal--Arista Networks
- Sanjay Mehrotra-- Micron Technology
- Laxman Narasimhan--Reckitt Benckiser
Bengaluru: The appointment of Parag Agrawal as the next Chief Executive Officer of Twitter has led to a raging debate over the brain drain happening in India with many bright students leaving the country for better opportunities.
However, analysts are of the opinion that the trend is slowly changing as many are coming back from the US and other developed countries because of rising opportunities in India.
"The situation was different at home two decades back. This has now changed. There are a plenty of opportunities in India now with evolving startup ecosystem," V Balakrishnan, chairman, Exfinity Venture Partners, and former CFO & board member at Infosys, told BizzBuzz.
On Monday, social media firm Twitter's cofounder Jack Dorsey announced that Agrawal would replace him as the next CEO of the company.
Agrawal, 37, will be the youngest person to run a company in the S&P 500 and joins the league of other India-born executives such as IBM's Arvind Krishna, Google's Sundar Pichai, Microsoft's Satya Nadella, Mastercard's CEO Ajay Banga, Arista Networks' CEO and president Jayshree V. Ullal, Micron Technology's CEO Sanjay Mehrotra and Reckitt Benckiser's CEO Laxman Narasimhan to lead large US firms that have a presence globally.
While social media is abuzz with the appointment of Agrawal as the new CEO of Twitter, many have also raised questions on how Indians are fleeing the country for greener pastures.
"While we all celebrate how Indians are become global tech CEOs and bask in this reflected glory, we as Indians need to ask what is making our best leave the country and what will reverse this trend in years to come. A country with its best talent leaving will not win big," tweeted Kunal Shah, founder of CRED. Meanwhile, celebrating the appointment, Chairman of Mahindra Group, Anand Mahindra wrote, "This is one pandemic that we are happy & proud to say originated in India. It's the Indian CEO Virus… No vaccine against it." Many startup founders and Indian fund houses feel that the country should support its startups through supply of risk capital.
"We need more risk capital to support Indian startups, that will help in creating the next Google and Apple from India. We don't have enough risk capital to support our startups. While it is a good thing that we have so many Indians as CEOs of top firms, we should create similar firms from India with our talent base," said Balakrishnan.
