CALIFORNIA, USA (Commonwealth Union)_ Indian American business tycoons Vinod Khosla, Romesh Wadhwani, and Rakesh Gangwal secured places in the Forbes 2022 list of the 400 wealthiest Americans, with Jay Chaudhry, CEO of Zscaler, topping the list with a $8.2 billion net worth. On the whole, Elon Musk of Tesla bagged the top rank for the first time, displacing former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who had retained the top position for four years in a row. According to Forbes, the collective wealth of the 400 wealthiest Americans is $4 trillion, which is $500 billion less than the previous year.
Chaudhry, the 63-year-old founder of the cybersecurity company Zscaler in 2008, was placed 79th on the list. He along with the members of his family hold 42% of the Nasdaq-listed company that went public in March 2018. Before establishing Zscaler, Chaudhry built four other technology firms namely, SecureIT, CoreHarbor, CipherTrust, and AirDefense. In 1996, Chaudhry and his wife resigned their respective professions and utilized their life savings to build their first firm, SecureIT.
The next billionaire on the list is 67-year-old Vinod Khosla, with a net worth of $5.2 billion, and placed 181 on the list. His company, Khosla Ventures, invests in innovative technologies like biomedicine and robotics. In 1982, Khosla along with Andy Bechtolsheim, Bill Joy, and Scott McNealy established the computer hardware company Sun Microsystems.
Founder and chairman of Symphony Technology Group, 67-year-old Romesh T. Wadhwani, was placed 196th on the list with a net value of $5.1 billion. In an attempt to prepare the company for a possible initial public offering, he resigned as SymphonyAI’s CEO in the beginning of the year. He also serves as the chairman of ConcertAI, which is an AI firm specializing in healthcare and life sciences. According to the venture capital investors, the net worth of the firm was $1.9 billion as of March 2022.
Rakesh Gangwal, a 69-year-old airline veteran with a net worth of $3.7 billion, built his wealth through InterGlobe Aviation, the parent company of India’s low-cost market-leading carrier IndiGo. In 1984, he began his airline career with United Airlines and eventually became the CEO and chairman of US Airways Group. Gangwal and Rahul Bhatia co-founded IndiGo in 2006 with just one aircraft. The citizen of Miami, who secured number 261 on the list, owns nearly 37% of the firm.
