Shantanu Narayen

Shantanu Narayen is an Indian American business executive, and the chairman and CEO of Adobe Inc.[6] Prior to this he had been the president and chief operating officer since 2005.[7]

He grew up in Hyderabad, India, the second son of a mother who taught American literature and a father who ran a plastics company.[8] He went to Hyderabad Public School in Hyderabad. Narayen earned a bachelor’s degree in electronics and communication engineering from University College of Engineering, Osmania University in Hyderabad, an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley, and a master’s degree in computer science from Bowling Green State University, Ohio.[9] Narayen once represented India in sailing at an Asian Regatta.[10]

He started his career at Apple.[4] After Apple, Narayen served as director of desktop and collaboration products for Silicon Graphics, then co-founded Pictra Inc. a company that pioneered the concept of digital photo sharing over the Internet.[9]

Narayen joined Adobe in 1998 as a senior vice-president of worldwide product research was later promoted to executive vice president of worldwide products, and appointed to his current post in November 2007 at the age of 45.

Promotion to CEO

In November 2007, Adobe Inc. announced that Bruce Chizen would step down as CEO effective 1 December, to be replaced by Narayen.[11]

Narayen is paid an annual salary of $1,000,000 for his role as chief executive.[12] He received total remuneration of $15.7 million in 2013.[13]

In 2011, Barack Obama appointed him as a member of his Management Advisory Board.[14]

As CEO, Shantanu and Adobes leadership team led the transformation of the company, moving its creative and digital document software franchises – which include flagship programs such as Photoshop, Premiere Pro and Acrobat/PDF – from the desktop to the cloud. In addition, during his tenure as CEO Adobe entered the digital experiences category, an expansion which began with the companys acquisition of Omniture in 2009.[15][16]

Adobe exceeded $100B in market cap for the first time in company history during Fiscal Year 2018. The company has added more than $100B in market cap during the last 5 years.[17]

Adobe became a Fortune 400 company in 2018.[18]

On May 2011, Narayen received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Bowling Green State University.[19]

Narayen currently serves as lead independent director on the board of directors for Pfizer Inc. and as vice chairman of the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum. He previously served on U.S. President Barack Obamas Management Advisory Board.[20][21]

In 2018 Narayen was ranked #12 on Fortunes Businessperson of the Year list. He was also named Global Indian of the Year in 2018 by the Economic Times of India.[20][21]

In 2019 he was a recipient of a Padma Shri award.[22]