Sridhar Vembu (born 1968) is an Indian billionaire business magnate and the founder and
CEO of
Zoho Corporation.[2] According to Forbes, he is the 55th richest person in India with a net worth of $3.75 billion, as of 2021.[3] He was awarded India's fourth highest civilian award, the
Padma Shri, in 2021.[4][5]
In 1996, Vembu, along with two of his brothers, founded a software development house for
network equipment providers called AdventNet.[6][8] The company was renamed
Zoho Corporation in 2009, focusing on providing
SaaS support to
Customer relationship management services.[6][2] Vembu moved to Tenkasi, India in 2019.[9] As of 2020, he held an 88 per cent stake in the company. Forbes estimated his net worth at USD $2.44 billion.[2][10] In 2021, Sridhar Vembu was appointed to
National Security Advisory Board.[11] Despite being a
unicorn, Zoho has been completely
bootstrapped by Vembu and his co-founder Tony Thomas to avoid external influence.[12]
In 2004, he set up Zoho Schools[clarification needed] to provide vocational software development education to rural students as an alternative to formal university education.[15] A statement from the company states that 15 to 20 per cent of its engineers have no college degree, but have received vocational education from Zoho Schools.[6] In 2020, he announced a "rural school startup" focused on free primary education.[14][8]
Political views
A former Zoho product marketing manager resigned in October 2018 after a dispute with Vembu over the employee's post on the company's
intranet discussion forum.[16] The employee stated that Vembu was hostile to him for criticising the
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a
Hindu nationalist paramilitary organisation.[17][18]
In January 2020, Vembu met with criticism after he attended, as the
guest of honour, a high-profile event organised by the RSS.[19][20][21] Vembu defended his participation as a matter of his personal choice.[22][23][24]
Honours
Vembu was awarded the 2019
Ernst & Young "Entrepreneur of the Year Award" in India.[25] He was also the recipient of the
Padma Shri, India's fourth highest civilian honour, in 2021.[26] He has also been selected as CNN-News18 Indian of the Year 2022.[27] He was also appointed to the
National Security Advisory Board (NSAB) of India in 2021 [28][29]