Sabeer
Bhatia
No one
symbolizes Indian
success and enterprise in the Information Age better than Sabeer
Bhatia. At an
age when most were in college or busy watching movies, Bhatia
accomplished two
things that can be called truly world-class. He started Hotmail, a
service that
now caters to over 100 million people in more than 30 countries across
the
world. And not just that- he made $400 million by selling it to
Microsoft! From
a country of Maharajas and snake charmers, it has become a country from
where
one can draw upon the intellectual resources of a large number of
high-technology people. Sabeer Bhatia's Hotmail is, for instance,
touching every
sphere of American's life.
Hotmail
is one of the
popular
free 'webmail' e-mail services, which are accessible from anywhere on
the
planet via a standard web browser. It was founded by Jack Smith of
Apple
Computers and Indian entrepreneur, Sabeer Bhatia in 1995, and was
commercially
launched on July 4th , 1996, lndependence Day of the USA,
symbolically representing freedom from ISPs.
“They wrote down all
variations
of mail - Speedmail, Hypermail, Supermail and finally settled for
Hotmail as it
included the letters "HTML" - the markup language used to write web
pages. It was initially referred to as HoTMaiL with selective upper
casing." A brand name was born. Every single day Homail adds 100,000
new
users. It has 12 million unique logins per month. A study says over 220
mlllion
people profit by it world over.
The
Times of Indin
recently
named him as 'One of the Indians of the Century', a pantheon which he
shares
with the likes of Mahatma Gandhi, Mohammad Ali Jinnah and Sunil
Gavaskar.
Sabeer Bhatia's creed is "Work hard, play hard." Bhatia's visionary
contribution to the Internet revolution has earned him widespread
acclaim. His
many awards and accolades include:
- Entrepreneur of the Year,
1997. Awarded by the venture capital firm Draper Fisher Urvetson.
- Named to the 'Elite 100,'
Upside magazine's list of top trendsetters in the New Economy.
- Recipient of the 'TR100'
Award, presented by MIT to 100 Young innovators who are expected to
have the greatest impact on technology in the next few years.
- Selected by the San Jose
Mercury News and POV magazine as one of the ten most successful
entrepreneurs of 1998.
Bhatia's
powers of
persuasion
and negotiating grit have become the stuff of Silicon Valley legend.
Bhatia was
born in Chandigarh in 1966 and raised in Bangalore. His father, who
held a high
post at the Ministry of Defence, and mother Daman, a senior official at
a state
bank, placed great value on education. Their only son did not
disappoint hem.
For parent-teacher days they would recall "Sir. We tell Sabeer to solve
the questions on the blackboard for us," says Bhatia's senior.
When a
college opened
nearby,
he decided to open a sandwich shop and drew up his first business plan.
Then
his mom said, "Stop thinking about these things and go and study."
But that's the culture in India. In 1988, Bhatia won a full scholarship
to the
California Institute of Technology, in Pasadena. When his plane touched
down
that tarmac Bhatia had $250 in his wallet and butterflies in his
stomach. “I
felt I had made a big mistake,” he says. “I knew nobody,
people looked
different, and it was hard for them to understand my accent and me to
understand theirs. I felt pretty lonely.”
People
say when Bhatia
enters a
room he owns it. "I call him the Hindu Robot," says Naveen Singha,
Bhatia's friend, mentor. "He is persistent, focused and disciplined.
He's
a superior human being." It was his primary education that he considers
as
the most valuable asset from India. He attributes his immense success
to his
hard work, perseverance and a vision for the future to make e-mail, the
No. 1
lnternet application, and thereby change the way people communicate. He
calls
himself: "I am an Indian-American. I was born and brought up in India
but
have now adopted America as my new home. Personally, I hope my success
serves
as a beacon of hope to young, bright Indians. I hope to be a role model
for
entrepreneurs in India and in Silicon Valley". His new company was
Arzoo.com. He closed shop in 2001.
Doug
Carlisle, a friend of his has commissioned
a bust-a bronze statue of Sabeer by an artist in Los Angles. And Bhatia
says:
"It is an honour. My hope is that, when entrepreneurs come into this
most
prestigious address on Sand Hill Road, it will give them an
inspiration".