Nothing Lacking in Indian Startup Entrepreneurs

High valuations of new businesses are a byproduct of the free market mechansism, says infosys co-founder nr narayana murthy.

- Debojyoti Ghosh

One of India’s most celebrated entrepreneurial minds, NR Narayana Murthy co-founded the $9.5 billion information technology (IT) giant Infosys in 1981. Since then, the self-made billionaire (his estimated net worth is $1.87 billion, putting him at No 62 on the 2016 Forbes India Rich List) has had an accomplished journey as a business leader. He led Infosys as its chief executive for over two decades, until 2002. Then, after relinquishing his executive role for almost a decade, Murthy returned as executive chairman of the Bengaluru-based IT major in 2013, only to step down a year later when he exited the board as well.

The company he co-founded has not only created lakhs of jobs, but also made several of its staffers millionaires through its employee stock option plan. As he once said in an address, “Wealth—financial, intellectual, or emotional—must be shared.” Apart from being chairman of Catamaran Management Services Pvt Ltd, the venture capital fund he founded in September 2009, the 70-year-old now divides his time between his engagements, including being on the boards of the Ford Foundation, the United Nations Foundation, the Rhodes Trust (University of Oxford) and chairing the Public Health Foundation of India. He is also a trustee of the board of the Infosys Science Foundation, a not-for-profit trust that aims to encourage the culture of science and research in the country.

Apart from being actively involved in these initiatives, the avid reader and lover of Western and Indian classical music is looking forward “to a peaceful, healthy and happy life”. In an interview to Forbes India, the recipient of the Padma Vibhushan spoke on a range of subjects: India’s burgeoning startup culture, the changing dynamics of the workforce in the IT industry and how the education system needs to be more receptive to newer ideas. Edited excerpts: