What is N. R. Narayana Murthy’s Net Worth?
N.R. Narayana Murthy is an Indian businessman who has a net worth of $4.6 billion. Narayana Murthy earned his fortune as the co-founder of Infosys, a multinational provider of business consulting, technology, engineering, and outsourcing services. Infosys is the second-largest Information Technology firm in India. The publicly-traded company (NYSE: INFY) generates $16 billion per year revenue and $4 billion in profits. As of this writing the company’s market cap is $80 billion but in recent times the valuation has been north of $100 billion.
Narayana’s daughter is designer Akshata Murty. Akshata’s husband is British politician Rishi Sunak. In October 2022 Rishi became the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. Thanks to Akshata’s roughly 39 million shares of Infoysis, Rishi is the richest Prime Minister in British history. At the time he became PM, their combined net worth was $800 million. That made Rishi around $200 million richer than King Charles.
Early Life
Nagavara Ramarao Narayan Murthy was born in Shidlaghatta, Karnataka on August 20, 1946. He was born into a middle-class Kannada family. He was a very bright student from a young age and was accepted into the National Institute of Engineering after high school. He graduated in 1967 with a degree in electrical engineering. He then received his master’s degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur.
Early Career
Murthy began his career by working as a research associate at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. He was later promoted to a chief systems programmer there where he worked on India’s first time-sharing computer system. He also designed and implemented a BASIC interpreter for Electronics Corporation of India Limited. Murthy then decided to start his own company which he called Softronics. However, the company failed after a year and a half, at which point he decided to join Patni Computer Systems in Pune, India.
Infosys
In 1981, Murthy and six other software professionals founded Infosys. The initial capital investment for the company was provided by Murthy’s wife, Sudha Murthy. Murthy took the position of CEO of the company and remained at the helm for 21 years, from 1981 to 2002. He was then succeeded in the position by co-founder, Nandan Nilekani. During his time in the leadership role, he was responsible for the initial massive growth of the company which included articulating, designing, and implementing a global delivery method for IT services outsourcing from India. From 2002 to 2006, he served as chairman of the board of the company and then afterward became the company’s chief mentor. He retired from the company in August of 2011, though he retained the title of chairman emeritus.
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Other Work
Outside of his work with Infosys, Murthy has been involved in a number of other business ventures. He is an independent director on the corporate board of HSBC. He has also served as a director on the boards of DBS Bank and other companies like Unilever, ICICI, an NDTV. Given his business acumen, he has also been asked to serve on advisory boards and in council positions for various educational organizations and philanthropic institutions. Some of these include Cornell University, the UN Foundation, the Ford Foundation, INSEAD, and ESSEC. He has additionally worked with the Indo-British Partnership and the Asian Institute of Management. He serves as trustee of the Rhodes Trust, the Infosys Prize, and the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. In 2005, he co-chaired the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland and also has served as Chairman of the Governing board of Public Health Foundation of India.Given his law background, Murthy also is on the strategic board which advises India’s national law firm, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas. He provides guidance on issues relating to strategy, policy, and various governance issues.
Murthy has also authored several books. He published “A Better India: A Better World” in 2009. In 2016, “The Wit and Wisdom of Narayana Murthy” was published. The following year, he published “A Clear Blue Sky: Stories and Poems on Conflict and Hope.”
Throughout his long and successful career, Murthy has been the recipient of many awards and honors. In 2003, he was given the Ernst & Young World Entrepreneur of the Year Award. The Government of the United Kingdom named him an Honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2007 and the Government of France named him an Officer of the Legion of Honour in 2008. The Asian Awards named him the Philanthropist of the Year in 2013. He was also given the CIF Global Indian Award by the Canada India Foundation in 2014.
Personal Life
Murthy is married to Sudha Murthy, a businesswoman, educator and author. She also is the chairperson of the Infosys Foundation. The Foundation was started in 1996 by Infosys and aims to support underprivileged sectors of society. Some of its main aims include providing access to basic healthcare, helping enhance educational opportunities in rural parts of India, and offering financial assistance to underprivileged artists and authors.
The couple have had two children together – a son named Rohan and a daughter named Akshata. In 2013, his son joined Infosys as an executive assistant to his father, though he decided to leave a year later. His daughter married Rishi Sunak, a British politician and leader of the Conservative Party.
In 1974, Murthy was arrested and expelled during the communist era in a border town on the Yugoslav-Bulgarian border. He describes the experience as having an immense impact on him and turning him into a compassionate capitalist. It also helped him develop the philosophy behind the foundation of Infosys.