Snowflake’s new CEO Sridhar Ramaswamy is an IIT Madras alumnus

A seasoned technology veteran born in India, Sridhar Ramaswamy has officially become the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Snowflake, a data cloud company based in the United States. Just a year ago, Snowflake acquired the startup co-founded by Ramaswamy. He replaced Frank Slootman, who held the CEO position for over four years.

Ramaswamy is among the distinguished group of global tech leaders of Indian descent, including Sundar Pichai from Google’s parent company Alphabet, Satya Nadella from Microsoft, Arvind Krishna from IBM, and Shantanu Narayen from Adobe.

The company said Ramaswamy will capitalise on “huge opportunities” in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML).

In May 2023, Snowflake acquired Neeva, co-founded by Ramaswamy, a former Google executive. Ramaswamy now leads Snowflake’s AI efforts and has launched Snowflake Cortex, a secure AI service.

During his 15-year tenure at Google, Ramaswamy played a vital role in advertising, witnessing significant revenue growth. He left in 2018, expressing concerns about ads impacting the user experience. Apart from his tech journey, he has a rich academic background, including a B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, and a Ph.D. from Brown University. He holds key positions, including serving on the board of trustees at Brown University.