Satya Nadella

Satya Narayana Nadella was born on 19 August 1967 in a Telugu Hindu family in Hyderabad. His father, Bukkapuram Nadella Yugandhar, was an Indian Administrative Service officer of the 1962 batch. His mother Prabhavati was a Sanskrit lecturer. Yugandhar hailed from Bukkapuram in Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh; his own father had migrated to Bukkapuram from Nadella village in Guntur district (present-day Palnadu district) of Andhra Pradesh.

Nadella attended the Hyderabad Public School, Begumpet before receiving a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the Manipal Institute of Technology in Karnataka in 1988. He then traveled to the United States to study for an MS in computer science at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, receiving his degree in 1990. He received an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business in 1997.

Sun Microsystems

Nadella worked at Sun Microsystems as a member of its technology staff before joining Microsoft in 1992.

Microsoft

1992–2014

At Microsoft, Nadella has led major projects that included the company's move to cloud computing and the development of one of the largest cloud infrastructures in the world.

Nadella worked as the senior vice-president of research and development (R&D) for the Online Services Division and vice-president of the Microsoft Business Division. Later, he was made the president of Microsoft's $19 billion Server and Tools Business and led a transformation of the company's business and technology culture from client services to cloud infrastructure and services. He has been credited for helping bring Microsoft's database, Windows Server and developer tools to its Azure cloud. The revenue from Cloud Services grew to $20.3 billion in June 2013 from $16.6 billion when he took over in 2011. He received $84.5 million in 2016 pay.

In 2013, Nadella's base salary was reportedly $669,167. Including stock bonuses, the total compensation stood at around $7.6 million.

Previous positions held by Nadella include:

President of the Server & Tools Division (9 February 2011 – February 2014)

Senior Vice-president of Research and Development for the Online Services Division (March 2007 – February 2011)

Vice-president of the Business Division

Corporate Vice-president of Business Solutions and Search & Advertising Platform Group

Executive Vice-president of Cloud and Enterprise group

In 1992, Nadella married Anupama Priyadarshini, the daughter of his father's Indian Administrative Service (IAS) batchmate. Both Nadella and Anupama are the only children from their parents. She was his junior at Manipal pursuing a B.Arch. in the Faculty of Architecture. The couple has three children, a son (deceased) and two daughters; they live in Clyde Hill and Bellevue, Washington. Their son Zain was legally blind and quadriplegic with cerebral palsy; he died in February, 2022, at the age of 26. According to Nadella, being the father of a child with special needs was a turning point in his life.

Nadella is an avid reader of American and Indian poetry and enjoys cricket, having played on his school team. He credits cricket for improving his leadership skills.

Nadella and his wife Anupama are part of the ownership group of Seattle Sounders FC, a Major League Soccer club.

In 2017, Nadella published a book titled Hit Refresh, exploring his life and career at Microsoft. He announced that the profits from the book would go to Microsoft Philanthropies and through that to nonprofit organizations.