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It took less than 30 minutes for Satya Nadella to be the top among most trending topics on Twitter, the micro-blogging website, an indication of the interest the globe has in checking the next chief executive officer (CEO) of Microsoft. The company's third since it was founded in 1975.
It took Microsoft seven months to select someone for the role as it embarks on a new journey.
In his email to employees, Nadella quoted Oscar Wilde: "We need to believe in the impossible and remove the improbable." On what needed to be done: "While we have seen great success, we are hungry to do more. Our industry does not respect tradition — it only respects innovation. This is a critical time for the industry and for Microsoft. Make no mistake, we are headed for greater places — as technology evolves and we evolve with and ahead of it. Our job is to ensure Microsoft thrives in a mobile and cloud-first world."
Further: "As we look forward, we must zero in on what Microsoft can uniquely contribute to the world. The opportunity ahead will require us to re-imagine a lot of what we have done in the past for a mobile and cloud-first world, and do new things."
Nadella, 46, has been with Microsoft for 22 years. He started at the server group, followed by the software division, online services, research and development, the advertising platform, back to the server division as its head and then overseeing cloud services (Azure). He was senior vice-president of R&D for the online services division and VP of the business division.
“Satya is extraordinarily humble and a great human being; so, almost anybody who knows him has nice things to say. That is in contrast to many leaders today who have ‘sharp elbows’," said Ravi Venkatesan, former chairman of Microsoft India, to Business Standard in an earlier interview.
Describing himself to Microsoft employees, Nadella wrote: "I’ve been married for 22 years and we have three kids. Like anyone else, a lot of what I do and how I think has been shaped by my family and my overall life experiences. Many who know me say I am also defined by my curiosity and thirst for learning. I buy more books than I can finish. I sign up for more online courses than I can complete. I fundamentally believe that if you are not learning new things, you stop doing great and useful things. So family, curiosity and hunger for knowledge all define me."
Nadella, who has an engineering degree in electronics and communication from Manipal Institute of Technology (Udupi, Karnataka), then moved to America, where he earned a master of science degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin. He is also an MBA from the University of Chicago. He worked at Sun Microsystems before joining Microsoft in 1992.
#satyafacts (Tweets on a lighter note)
* Where's Satya Nadella's grand plan for Microsoft? It's in the clouds, fools
* Satya Nadella doesn't have doors in his house. Because he believes in windows
* Satya Nadella doesn't just run Windows Azure, he *is* Windows Azure
* Why does Satya Nadella wear glasses? because he loves to C#
* Satya Nadella's favorite color? Azure
* Satya Nadella can bench-press a server rack
* Satya Nadella and Mark Zuckerberg share a stylist
