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Concur Technologies, the US-based company to which German enterprises software maker SAP has agreed to buy for $7.3 billion, has a strong Indian connection.
The Nasdaq-listed company that makes expenses and travel management software was co-founded by three in 1993 including two brothers — Sudhir Steven Singh and Rajiv Singh, whose father, an engineer, migrated to the US from India in the early 1960s.
While the elder sibling, better known as Steve was born in India, the younger one was born in the US though all of them received their educations there. Steve is presently the chairman and CEO while Rajiv is the president and chief operating officer of the company he initially launched from his apartment with a friend Michael Hilton.
The company which over the years transformed itself as a software-as-a-service provider has online tools that are used by around 23,000 customers worldwide. Its revenue run rate stands at $700 million with over 4,200 employees globally.
“I was a product of India, but I grew up in Michigan. I spent the early part of my professional career in Silicon Valley working for a division of Apple,” Steve told in one of his media interviews.
Steve spent early part of his professional life in the Silicon Valley working for a division of Apple where he wrote code on the company’s Macintosh platform. Then, with Hilton, he started Contact Software, maker of ACT that got acquired by Symantec. He also had a stint at Oracle and then Symantec before becoming the CEO of Concur.
The younger sibling Rajiv after finishing his engineering had a stint with Ford Motor Company the experience of which was 'miserable’ going by his own confession.
“As a first generation Indian immigrant family, I think if there are any Indians out there watching, they could tell you Indian parents will ask you first, second and third about grades, so you better be getting good grades and optimally, hopefully you’re planning to become an engineer or a doctor,” Rajiv had once said sharing his experience of entrepreneurship in the US.
“But I would say secondarily, the thing that came from a guy who worked at large companies his whole life like my father did was…it would be a lot more fun to do this for yourselves. Take a little risk when you’re young and take a shot at this and take a swing at this,” he had said.
The acquisition (of Concur by SAP) is expected to close in the fourth quarter of this year or the first quarter of 2015.
