India Born Thomas Kurian To Lead Google’s Cloud Business

Google has tapped Oracle veteran Thomas Kurian to lead its cloud business. Kurian left Oracle in September this year after a 22-year career at the software giant.

He will join the company this month and take over from Diane Greene in January next year. Greene, the current CEO of Google Cloud, announced this transition at the top post of Google Cloud in a blog post under the heading “Transitioning Google Cloud after three great years.”

“Thomas Kurian, a respected technologist, and executive, will be joining Google Cloud on November 26th and transitioning into the Google Cloud leadership role in early 2019,” she said in her post.

“I believe that he’ll do an amazing job helping to take Google Cloud to the next level,” she added.

She also said that she will continue to serve as a CEO through January, working with Kurian to ensure a smooth transition. She will remain a Director on the board of Alphabet, Google’s parent company.

Kurian, who was born in Kerala and grew up in Bengaluru, did his BS in electrical engineering from Princeton University. Before joining Princeton, he spent six months at IIT Madras. He also possesses MBA degree from Stanford University. He served at Oracle from 1996-2018.

Praising the leadership of Greene, Google’s CEO Sunder Pichai said, “In a few short years, Diane’s leadership, Cloud has become an incredible business built on Google’s decades of investment in infrastructure, data security, and AI.”

He also expressed hope for a fruitful association with Kurian as saying, “We’re really excited to welcome Thomas whose product vision, customer focus, and deep expertise will be a huge asset to our growing Cloud business.”

Responding to the declaration of his name as the next CEO of Google Cloud, Kurian said, “I’m excited to join the fantastic Google Cloud team at this important and promising time. I’m looking forward to building on the success of recent years as it enters its next phase of growth.”