New York: Satya Nadella and Sundar Pichai, both of Indian origin, have secured top positions in Fortune magazine’s 2025 list of the 100 Most Powerful People in Business. Nadella, CEO and Chairman of Microsoft, is ranked second, while Pichai, CEO of Alphabet and Google, is in sixth place.
Nadella, born in Hyderabad, India, has led Microsoft through two major shifts—from personal computing to cloud services, and now into the AI era. Fortune credits his early bet on OpenAI as positioning Microsoft at the forefront of the generative AI race. While Microsoft’s partnership with OpenAI has faced tensions, the company has maintained its place among Big Tech’s most dominant players.
“Considered one of the sharpest strategic minds in management today as well as a charismatic and empathetic leader,” Fortune wrote, “He has the ear of Fortune 500 CEOs, startup founders, investors, and presidents and prime ministers.”
Pichai, who grew up in Chennai, India, and later moved to the U.S., oversees a conglomerate that includes Google, YouTube, Android, and Waymo. With a market cap over $2 trillion, Alphabet remains a central player in global tech.
“Pichai… knows that he can’t sit still,” Fortune noted. The company has faced pressure from regulators and the rising threat of AI disruption to its core search business. Under his leadership, Alphabet has reorganized its internal AI teams and rolled out new features like AI overviews in search results.
Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, topped this year’s list, displacing Elon Musk, who fell to fourth place. Last year’s No. 1, Musk dropped in the rankings following a shift in Fortune’s assessment of his influence, especially after his diminished role in U.S. political affairs.
Other Indian-origin leaders on the 2025 list include Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen (ranked 38), Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani (56), Vertex Pharmaceuticals CEO Reshma Kewalramani (62), and Adani Group founder Gautam Adani (96).
