Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kanpur is one of India's prestigious educational institutions. Founded in 1959 with 100 students and a small faculty in a rented building of Harcourt Butler Institute of Technology, IIT Kanpur today houses a well-structured infrastructure with approximately 2255 undergraduate and 1476 graduate students, 309 faculty members, and more than 900 support staff. IIT Kanpur alumni stories and IIT Kanpur alumni achievements are not just carved on the walls of the institute, but they echo throughout the history of the Indian business realm and even beyond the borders. Here is a small story of legendary alumni of IIT Kanpur who have achieved great success in their professional and entrepreneurial lives with hard work.

N. R. Narayana Murthy

N. R. Narayana Murthy is an Indian technology leader who co-founded Infosys Technologies. Under his leadership, the company was listed on the American Stock Exchange. This Indian IT sector legend received his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Mysore in 1967 and a master’s degree in technology from the IIT Kanpur in 1969. 

The tech leader worked in Paris in the 1970s, where he designed an operating system for air cargo handling at Charles de Gaulle Airport.  After a few years, Narayana returned to India and continued working for a computer systems company in Pune. In 1981, he co-founded Infosys with six fellow computer professionals. In 1999, Infosys became the first Indian company to be listed on an American stock exchange. Narayan received many honors for his work, and Asiaweek added Narayana to its Power 50, the magazine’s annual list of the most powerful people in the region.  Besides, BusinessWeek conferred him the Stars of Asia Award for three consecutive years from 1998 to 2000, and he was Fortune magazine’s 2003 Asian Businessman of the Year.

Pawan Kumar Goenka

Pawan Kumar Goenka is a well-known Indian businessman. He is the retired Managing Director of Mahindra & Mahindra, an Indian multinational automobile manufacturing company headquartered in Mumbai, and Chairman of Ssangyong Motors of Korea. He is currently the Chairman of INSPACE, India's space program.

Dr. Pawan completed his B.Tech. in Mechanical Engineering from IIT Kanpur, and received a Ph.D. from Cornell University, USA.  He is also a graduate of the Advanced Management Program from Harvard Business School. He received the Extraordinary Accomplishment Award from General Motors in 1986, the Burt L. Newkirk Award for the year 1987, and the Charles L. McCuen Achievement Award from General Motors for the years 1985 & 1991, an Outstanding International Advisor Award from SAE in 1997, and a Distinguished Alumni Award from IIT Kanpur in 2004.  He received the Engineering Excellence Award 2012 from the SAE India Foundation.  

Arvind Krishna

Arvind Krishna is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of IBM.   Arvind has played a key leadership role in building IBM’s business strategy. He succeeded in expanding new markets in artificial intelligence, cloud computing, quantum computing, and blockchain. He also plays a key role in the development of innovative IBM products and solutions based on these new technologies.

In his 30 years of professional journey at IBM, Arvind undertook bold transformations that have delivered proven business results.  He played a pivotal role in the successful $34 billion Red Hat acquisition, the largest software acquisition of its kind, which defined the hybrid cloud market. IBM and Red Hat offer customers the unique ability to build mission-critical applications once and run anywhere.

Arvind completed his undergraduate at the IIT Kanpur and went on to take a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has received distinguished alumni awards from both institutions.

 

Pradeep Sindhu

Hailing from a military family, Pradeep Sindhu pursued a career in the Indian Administrative Services (IAS).  As per his father’s wish, he joined IIT Kanpur in 1970 to study electrical engineering.  He completed his further education at the University of Hawaii, which became a major milestone in his networking and computing journey.  Later in 1976,  he joined Carnegie Mellon University for his master’s and doctorate in computer science on high-performance multiprocessors. In 1984, Pradeep became a research scientist at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC).

However, in 1995,  he decided to resign from his job and start his own venture.  At first, he tried to bring his concepts to life on the market.  After a few months, he established a business focused on providing high-performance routers to cater to the rapidly growing Internet demand. In September and November 1995, he developed a design.  Proceeding with this, he embarked on a search for venture capitalists since the project required substantial funding.  He got rejected by three VCs, and on one fine day, he succeeded in convincing Vinod Khosla at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers to invest in his company.

In 1999, Juniper Networks went public. Ever since, the company has continued to innovate and develop new products and technologies, maintaining its position at the forefront of high-performance networking. With 88 offices across 43 countries and revenue of $4.8 billion, Juniper has been ranked among the top 100 largest publicly traded companies in the US, according to the 2016 Newsweek Green Rankings. Pradeep received the Morgan Stanley Leadership Award for Global Commerce in 2010, and  Juniper Networks ranked 36th in the United States for Newsweek's 2015 Green Rankings list of the top 500 US Companies. Besides, Juniper Networks was recognized as one of the world’s ‘Most Ethical Companies’ by Ethisphere Institute in 2015 and also received the distinguished Alumni Award in 2001 from IIT Kanpur.

Bhaskar Pramanik

When we hear the name Bhaskar Pramanik, the first thing that flashes is technology. Yes, Bhaskar is the retired Chairman of Microsoft Corporation (India) Pvt. Ltd. Before joining Microsoft,  Bhaskar worked for Oracle, where he performed leadership roles for increasing customer satisfaction and motivating employees.  Previously, he also held leadership roles across management positions at Sun Microsystems, Digital Equipment India Ltd, Blue Star Ltd., and NELCO.

An engineering graduate from the IIT Kanpur,   Bhaskar studied his Advanced Marketing Management Program at Stanford University. He holds the board authority of several organizations, including the State Bank of India, is a member of the Executive Council of NASSCOM, and is the co-chair of the National Committee for IT, ITES & e-Commerce at CII. In the past, he has held leadership positions at industry bodies such as MAIT and AMCHAM.