Founder of Indian tech giant Infosys, Narayana Murthy celebrates his 72nd birthday today (August 20). A celebrated industrialist of contemporary time, Murthy, along with six engineers in Pune, started an IT company with an initial capital of $250.  In the consequent 35 years to come, the company grew to $11.12 billion with a market capitalisation of $42.4 billion.

Murthy started Infosys in 1981 and served as its CEO from 1981 to 2002 and then as chairman from 2002 to 2011. Following that, he resigned from the board and became chairman emeritus of Infosys. In 2013 he was appointed as additional director and executive chairman of the board for a term of five years.

Today, Infosys has a growing global presence with over 84 offices and 116 development centres across Asia-Pacific, America, Europe and the Middle East.

Infosys completed 25 years of listing on Indian stock exchanges in 2018.

In 2017, Murthy was making headlines for raising concerns over alleged corporate governance lapses at Infosys. The company denied this, and the whole incident eventually led to Murthy’s resignation.

Time magazine described Murthy as the ‘Father of Indian IT Sector’. Under his leadership, Infosys became the first Indian IT company to be listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market. Infosys also became the first listed Indian IT company with a revenue of $1 billion a year.

Murthy is married to Sudha Murthy, a renowned social activist and author. They are parents to a son, Rohan Murthy and a daughter, Akshata Murthy.