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For a CEO of a global company, Shantanu Narayen had a normal background. His father ran a plastics company and his mother taught American literature, and Shantanu studied at the Hyderabad Public School. After his eng­ineering at Osmania University, he went to do an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley, and followed it up with an MS from Bowling Green State University, Ohio.

Starting his career at Apple Inc, he moved on to Silicon Graphics and co-founded photosharing company Pictra before joining Adobe in 1998. He bec­ame its CEO in 2005 and is one of the most decorated CEOs today. In 2011, Barack Obama app­ointed him as a member of his management advisory board to advise him on best business practices in federal government matters.

At Adobe, Narayen has been responsible for one of its most vibrant phases, marked by high growth and acquisition of some marquee companies like Macromedia and Omniture. In 2010, there was heightened talk of a confrontation of his Adobe and Steve Jobs-led Apple over issues related to running of Adobe’s Flash player on Apple’s iPad. Narayen holds five patents in his name. Married, and with two sons, he is a voracious reader and initially wanted to become a journalist.