India Surpasses Israel In Forbes’ Billionaire List: Meet The Richest Indian-Origin Americans

The United States’ history is full of immigrants who have significantly contributed to shape the country’s success, bring cultural richness, and economic liveliness to the nation. It’s not just a narrative in the American history but a dominant example that is reflected in America’s Richest Immigrants list released by Forbes, which features 12 US billionaires born in India.

According to Forbes, India added the second most immigrant billionaires to the list and surpassed Israel as the birthplace of the most billionaire immigrants. The number goes to 12. Newcomers from India include 53-year-old Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, 57-year-old Microsoft chief Satya Nadella and 57-year-old Nikesh Arora who has run cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks since 2018, Forbes reported on Wednesday.

Israel and Taiwan each have 11 billionaires. In 2022, India had 7 billionaires, while Israel had 10. That year, Asian giant Taiwan had 4 people on Forbes’ foreign-born richest persons list, according to the list.

Pointing out a surprising fact that many came to America for university and never left, the Forbes specially mentions 65-year-old cybersecurity mogul Jay Chaudhry, saying he had never been on a plane before when he flew from his native India to attend graduation school at the University of Cincinnati in 1980. Chaudhry holds the title of the richest Indian American, with a net worth exceeding $17.9 billion. 

Indian Americans Who Secured Their Names On Forbes’ America’s Richest Immigrants list

1.       Sundar Pichai: Pichai is CEO of Google parent Alphabet, a position he has held since 2019, when he was tapped to replace Google cofounder Larry Page. He holds around 0.02% of Alphabet and has sold more than $500 million worth of shares, before taxes. Born in Chennai, India, Pichai grew up with limited access to technology but was always interested in how it can create community. He said that in 1993, his father spent a year’s salary on a plane ticket to California so Sundar could attend Stanford.

2.       Satya Nadella: Nadella joined Microsoft in 1992 and rose to CEO in 2014, when his billionaire predecessor, Steve Ballmer, retired that year. As CEO, Nadella has built Microsoft Azure into a leading cloud computing platform and overseen the acquisitions of LinkedIn for $26 billion in 2016 and Activision Blizzard for $69 billion 2023. 

3.       Nikesh Arora: Arora has been chairman and CEO of cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks since 2018. He has netted nearly $800 million (before taxes) exercising options and selling shares since 2023. He previously worked at Google for nearly a decade, where he rose to chief business officer, before leaving for Japanese investment giant SoftBank in 2014.

4.       Jay Chaudhry: Chaudhry is CEO of Zscaler, a cybersecurity firm he founded in 2008. It went public in March 2018. Before Zscaler, Chaudhry founded four other tech companies that were all acquired: SecureIT, CoreHarbor, CipherTrust and AirDefense. His hometown, a village in the Himalayas in India, did not have electricity or running water until he was in the 8th and 10th grade, respectively. Chaudhry moved to the U.S. in 1980 to attend graduate school and now lives in Nevada, after relocating from the Bay Area.

5. Vinod Khosla: Khosla is known for Sun Microsystems and venture capital. He owns a net worth of $9.2 billion.

Other names include Rakesh Gangwal, worth $6.6 billion from the airline industry; and Romesh T Wadhwani, with $5 billion from the software industry.

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