The 10 Indian Students Who Transformed American Success

They came to America with suitcase full of books, hope in their hearts, and in most cases no more than a pocketful of dollars in their pockets. Where there was no money, there was plenty of guts and inherent talent. These ten Indian students—some from small towns, some from premier colleges—came to America not in name, but in hope. Today, they are health, tech, and public policy titans, a testament to the reality that talent nationality is never anywhere and victory is never linguistic.

Vinod Khosla: From Rejection to Reinvention

Denied first choice at IIT Delhi, Khosla majored in mechanical engineering, attended Stanford, co-founded Sun Microsystems, and ended up one of Silicon Valley's most famous venture capitalists. "IIT was the only level playing field," he once told The Chronicle of Higher Education. Today, he makes other people's dreams others have not yet had the courage to dream.

Kanwal Rekhi: The Man with Eight Dollars and a Vision

He stepped onto American soil with just $8, a degree from IIT Bombay, and unshakable resolve. Rekhi’s journey through layoffs and struggle led him to Silicon Valley, where he built Excelan—the first Indian-owned tech firm to go public on Nasdaq—and mentored a generation of Indian-American entrepreneurs.

Suhas Patil: Father of the Fabless Chip

From MIT to IIT Kharagpur, Patil had less money in his pocket but a mind that would revolutionize semiconductors once and for all. From Cirrus Logic, he developed the "fabless" model of business that led to chip manufacturing and exporting today.

Vinod Dham: The Pentium Father

With a degree in electrical engineering and just $8 in his wallet, Dham was among the people who helped develop the Pentium processor that powered PCs for millions and changed personal computing forever.

Shantanu Narayen: Revolutionizing Adobe

Engineering alum Narayen, born in Hyderabad, joined Adobe and became CEO. Under his watch, Adobe revolutionized itself into a cloud-based subscription model business, revolutionizing consumption of creative tools worldwide.

Satya Nadella: The Humble Revolutionary

From Manipal to Microsoft, the humble determination of Nadella was able to get Microsoft overhauled as a cloud-first firm and the largest tech giant in the world. His pragmatic, open-minded, and vision-driven approach of leadership attracted a new generation of technology leaders to Microsoft.

Nikesh Arora: Cybersecurity's Power Player

IIT BHU graduate who reached the top of Google search rankings to be among America's highest-paid executives, Arora is now the chief executive at Palo Alto Networks, international cyber security shielding millions online.

Siddhartha Mukherjee: The Storyteller of Science

From AIIMS Delhi to the Pulitzer Prize, Mukherjee's The Emperor of All Maladies brought human beings into cancer's story. His book marries medicine and poetry to educate the world about illness in the form of stories.

Atul Gawande: The Doctor Who Rewrote the Rules

Surgeon, writer, and activist, Gawande's Checklist Manifesto was hospital scripture nationwide, safer surgery. With Being Mortal, he took dying patients at the brink of life, reshaping how doctors discuss dying.

Vivek Murthy: America's Doctor with an Indian Heart

An immigrant himself, Murthy was the 19th and 21st U.S. Surgeon General. From fighting the opioid epidemic to leading COVID-19 initiatives, his number one priority never changed—science, compassion, and public trust.