Satya Nadella earns ₹847 crore in FY25:Microsoft CEO’s earnings rise 22% annually; AI is major driver of the tech company’s growth

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella received a salary of $96.5 million or ₹847 crore in fiscal year 2024-25 (FY25). This is his highest salary ever, which is 22% more than last year. In fiscal year 2023-24 (FY24), Nadella received a salary of $79.1 million or ₹694 crore. The company’s board credited this growth to Microsoft’s excellent progress in Artificial Intelligence (AI). Nadella’s basic salary is ₹22 crore The board says that Nadella and his team have made Microsoft the world leader in the AI sector. In Nadella’s salary package, $2.5 million or ₹22 crore is basic salary, while the majority of the remaining portion (about 90%) is in the form of Microsoft shares. Not just Nadella, his top team’s earnings have also increased. Chief Financial Officer Amy Hood received a package of $29.5 million (₹259 crore) and Commercial Business Head Judson Althoff received a package of $28.2 million (₹247 crore). Microsoft’s dominance in Cloud and AI Under Nadella’s leadership, Microsoft has achieved tremendous growth in cloud computing and AI. The company’s Azure cloud business is giving tough competition to big competitors like Amazon. This year Microsoft’s shares have increased by 23%, which shows the company’s strong position. Nadella recognized the power of cloud services early on and left no stone unturned in making Azure the market leader. Acquired companies like GitHub-LinkedIn Nadella did not limit Microsoft to just being a software company. He acquired major companies like GitHub and LinkedIn, which strengthened the company in software development and professional networking. Additionally, Activision Blizzard was acquired to boost Microsoft’s growth in the gaming sector. This has made the company even stronger in the gaming world. Microsoft’s Partnership with OpenAI Nadella’s biggest masterstroke was investing in OpenAI. In 2019, Microsoft invested $1 billion (₹8,775 crore) in this then-small AI startup. Later, ChatGPT’s success made OpenAI a superstar in the AI world. Microsoft then made an additional investment of $10 billion (₹87,745 crore). Now, AI features have been added to almost every product and service of the company. Nadella’s journey from Hyderabad to Microsoft Born in Hyderabad, the techie received his degree in Electrical Engineering from Mangalore University in 1988. After this, he went to America and completed his Masters in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 1990. He started his career with Sun Microsystems. Later, he joined Microsoft in 1992. Here, he worked on projects like Windows NT and gradually took over the leadership of the company’s cloud business. On 04 February 2014, he became Microsoft’s third CEO after Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer.