Google’s Sundar Pichai one of the highest paid CEOs in world; this is how much he earned

Indian origin Sundar Pichai is one of the most paid CEOs in the world and he got a compensation of more than $280 million in 2019, Alphabet Inc said in a regulatory filing recently. On the other hand, CEO’s of other large companies earned less than $200 million in recent years, as per compensation tracked by Equilar, IANS reported. A major chunk of Sundar Pichai’s salary is in stock awards and some of this will be paid out depending on Alphabet’s stock return relative to the returns of other companies in the S&P 100 index. The jump in Pichai’s last year compensation is also mainly due to stock awards after he became CEO of Alphabet late last year, said the report on Friday. At the time of his taking over as CEO, his compensation was around $200 million, most of it in vesting stock awards, IANS cited a MarketWatch report. As coronavirus continues its onslaught on economies around the world, Sundar Pichai is likely to cut back on marketing expenses and hiring this year.

After his promotion, Sundar Pichai’s base salary rose to $2 million from previous compensation of $650,000, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Further to a rise in his base salary, Sundar Pichai was also presented with two stock packages that vest over time. While Sundar Pichai’s salary is more than those of other CEO’s, the only large exception was in 2018 when Elon Musk, Tesla CEO got about $2.3 billion due to a stock grant based on future performance.

Earlier, the Google chief had donated Rs 5 crore to an organisation as the country grapples with the coronavirus crisis. The proceeds of the donation will largely be utilised to help daily wage earners as India remains under a lockdown. “Thank you Sundar Pichai for matching Google org’s Rs 5 crore grant to provide desperately needed cash assistance for vulnerable daily wage worker families,” Bengaluru-based non-profit organisation GiveIndia said in a tweet two weeks back. Google had also earlier pledged over $800 million for helping the world as coronavirus outbreak spreads globally.