Google CEO Sundar Pichai at IIT-KGP: Talks startups, machine learning, Digital India and more

Do you still get calls from college friends?

Pichai: Yes I do. It is easier to stay in touch now. We follow each other on Facebook, WhatsApp just like every one else. We recently met in Bengaluru

In his free time Pichai likes to watch cricket and keep in touch with family and friends.

Pichai is too embarassed to admit his GPA in the first year, but good enough in the following three years. 

Idol during BTech days? I admired people from all walks of life. This week I met Narayana Murthy. I love cricket and watching Sachin Tendulkar play.

Favourite Bollywood actress: Deepika Padukone, I had interviewed her and Shah Rukh Khan at Google. I used to enjoy watching Prakash Padukone play badminton.

On future insecurity of getting a job: 

Pichai says that there have been many instances when he has felt that there were always better than him. It is a natural feeling. If you feel very comfortable in what you are doing, then you are not challenging yourself enough.

Pichai’s tips to students

Understanding things deeper. Be passionate

Setbacks don’t matter. Not getting into a college is not the end of the road

Keep your hopes up and follow your dreams

The Next Big thing in R7D at Google?

Pichai says Advances in machine learning will be the focus area. Pichai says Google alone wont do it, but he is excited to bring the advantages of Machine learning and AI to real life use cases

What is Sundar Pichai’s leadership style?

Pichai: We have over 60000 employees. So I rely on other leaders in my team. trust them to do the right thing and ensure that they are successful. You work is to remove roadblocks from what they do. I value team work. Setting up collaborative cultures is what I am working at. It is not about me but my team.

On Education Pichai says: 

India’s strength is the tremendous respect for education. But Education needs to evolve. There is a lot of emphasis on rote learning, but it is important to be well rounded, try different things, take some risks. I would encourage people to follow their passions. There is a lot of pressure to follow set lanes. I think it is imporatnt to get real world experience. At Stanford, most students dont choose their majors till the last year. Academics is important but not as important as its made out to be in the Indian context.

Question: How do you compete with MNCs which have access to a large market and large investments?

Pichai: India has a huge potential. Digital market is still developing. As companies get built here, it is difficult to scale up and reach the full potential as there are still many people to get online. These same products can also work in Vietnam, Myanmar, and other countries. So we need to expand our vision. IN the next 5-10 years I forsee a lot of big software companies coming out of India.

Question: What is it that drives innovation at Google?

Pichai: We have a 10x or Moonshot experience at Google. We want to solve a real world problem. We try and use deep computer science. You have to aim high enough that there is no competition. Even if you fail, you always end up learning something in the process.

Question: Craziest thing you have done at IIT KGP

Pichai: I had my share of all the experiences which all of you go through. we did stay up late and miss classes the next day. Overall though we had a very good group of folks living in a campus like this.

Question 1: When did you realise that you had reached a checkpoint in your career chart

Pichai: I always wanted to build a product. I always wanted to work on a computing product which could reach multiple users and I was focussed on that.

.@RajanAnandan begins the #BackOnCampus at IIT Kharagpur @GoogleIndia pic.twitter.com/z5byCLil36

— Tech2 (@tech2eets) January 5, 2017