Vishal Sikka, the new Infosys CEO, is the brain behind game-changing HANA platform that converges database and application platform capabilities in-memory to allow businesses to operate in real-time.
He was the chief technology officer of SAP and a member of the Executive Board as well as the Global Managing Board. He quit from the board on May 4 2014 citing personal reasons.
Born and raised:
June 1, 1967, in Vadodara. He is the son of an Indian Railways officer.
Education:
He graduated from Rosary High School. And went on to study computer engineering at Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda.
After completing his MS in Computer Science at Syracuse University, Sikka was accepted for the doctoral program at Stanford University. His dissertation was titled Integrating Specialized Procedures into Proof Systems. He graduated with his Ph D in 1996.
Early career and start-ups:
After a stint at Xerox’s research labs, Sikka founded iBrain which competed at the time with Business Objects. iBrain was acquired by PatternRX, Inc.
His second start-up, Bodha.com, focused on developing technology for non-invasive, service-based integration of enterprise applications and information. Peregrine Systems then acquired Bodha.com. and he became their area Vice-President for Platform Technologies, responsible for application development and integration technologies and architecture.
Move to SAP:
Sikka joined SAP in 2002 to head the advanced technology group responsible for strategic innovative projects.
In April 2007, Sikka was named SAP’s first-ever CTO reporting to then CEO Henning Kagermann.
In the wake of Léo Apotheker’s resignation from the executive board in 2010, Sikka was named to a newly reconstituted board, along with new co-CEOs Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe.
On May 4 2014, Vishal Sikka, Executive Board Member for Products and Innovation, announced his departure from the Executive Board for personal reasons, effective immediately.
The making of HANA:
A car accident in Costa Rica in 2008, where Sikka was vacationing with family, was a turning point in Sikka’s life as well as that of SAP. Though no one was seriously injured, Sikka wanted to move on in life rather than continue with his job. Over a dinner in 2008 in Aspen, Sikka explained to SAP’s founder Hasso Plattner that he wanted out of the company and work on new technological areas which were affecting data computation speed. Plattner, in turn challenged Sikka to intellectually renew SAP and gave him a free hand in doing so. Thus, HANA (High Performance Analytic Appliance), one of the fastest selling SAP product, was born, which completely changed the fortunes of SAP.