Equilar-NYT Highest Paid CEOs: Two Indian Americans Enter Top 10


FREMONT, CA: Equilar, the leading provider of board intelligence solutions, along with The New York Times newspaper, has announced the annual Equilar-The New York Times 200 Highest-Paid CEOs list for 2018. Many Indian executives have made into a list, including two in the top 10.

The Equilar-NYT 200 is an annual survey that analyzes the highest paid CEOs in U.S. companies that are worth at least $1 billion in revenue.

“The Equilar 200 of 2018 marks the 13th consecutive year of partnership with The New York Times, where we analyze the data on the pay scale of top CEOs,” an Equilar spokesperson said in a news release. “This year, the study highlighted few key points that include a pay package of more than $2 billion and an unprecedented median total return figure,” it mentioned.

Elon Musk, head of Tesla, has topped the list this time. The two Indians in the list are Nikesh Arora, CEO of Palo Alto Networks (PAN), and Vivek Shah, CEO of j2 Global, who came in at No. 3 and No. 10 respectively. According to the report, Arora gained a compensation of $125,068,836, while Shah had acquired $45,062,153. Musk, miles ahead with no competition at all, was valued at $2,284,044,884.

Arora, an M.B.A. graduate from Northeastern University in Boston, has done M.S. in finance from the Boston College, along with B.Tech in electrical engineering, Institute of Technology at Banaras Hindu University. He has served as the chairman of the board of directors of Palo Alto Networks and CEO since June 2018. He has work experience in working with different roles with SoftBank Group Corp., and Google, Inc. prior to PAN. Arora also serves as a board member of Compagnie Financiere Richemont S.A., a Switzerland-based luxury goods holding public company.

As per the report, Shah was elected to j2 Global's Board of Directors in January 2018, where he has also served as CEO. Previously, he had served with Ziff Davis and Time, Inc. Shah has been recognized with awards like Online Publisher of the Year by MIN, Innovator of the Year by BtoB's Media Business, and was inducted into MIN's Digital Hall of Fame. He was also selected to the Crain's Forty under 40 list. Shah has a B.A. in political science from Tufts University.

The other Indian American executives that made the list include Shantanu Narayan, Adobe at No. 25, Satya Nadella, Microsoft, at No. 36, Ajay Banga, MasterCard, at No. 77, and Bob Patel, LyondellBasell Industries, at No. 109.

The report said that the top five CEOs alone took more than $100 million in total compensation, while Musk’s alone achieved a staggering amount of $2.3 billion.

The Equilar also reports of a possible trend of massive pay packages growing in prevalence, particularly as large corporations seek to retain top executive talent.

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