Alphabet Inc appoints Sundar Pichai to its board of directors

Alphabet Inc, Google’s parent company, has appointed Indian-American Google CEO Sundar Pichai to its board of directors.

Alphabet CEO Larry Page
Alphabet CEO Larry Page. Photo courtesy: Wikipedia

“Sundar has been doing a great job as Google's CEO, driving strong growth, partnerships and tremendous product innovation. I really enjoy working with him and I'm excited that he is joining the Alphabet board,” Alphabet CEO Larry Page said in a statement.

Pichai is responsible for its product development and technology strategy as Google's CEO and also responsible for the company's day-to-day operations.

He joined Google in 2004 and helped lead the development of key consumer products, which are now used by over a billion people.

In 2014, he took over product, engineering and research efforts for all of Google's products and platforms.

After years of working closely with Google's co-founders, Page and Sergey Brin, Pichai became Google's CEO in August 2015.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai
Google CEO Sundar Pichai. Photo courtesy: Twitter

Pichai, who met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his US visit in June, said that Google was excited about investing in India.

During a visit to Kolkata earlier this year, Pichai expressed confidence that big global software companies will begin emerging in India in the next five to 10 years.

"In a five to 10-year time frame, we will see big global software companies coming out of India and we will be used to it," Pichai said during an event for students from his alma mater, IIT-Kharagpur, where he earned his degree in metallurgical engineering.