Google India, SEA VP Rajan Anandan quits, to join Sequoia Capital

Vikas Agnihotri, country director, sales, will replace Rajan Anandan in the interim for Google India.

Before Google, Anandan was Managing Director at Microsoft India for two years. (Google)

Rajan Anandan, Google South East Asia and India Vice President, will leave the firm at the end of April. Vikas Agnihotri, country director, sales, will replace Anandan in the interim for Google India.

Anandan had been associated with Google for about eight years. He is credited for pushing Google's efforts to personalise its services for India.

Before Google, Anandan was Managing Director at Microsoft India between September 2008 and August 2010. Earlier, he worked with Dell India as Vice President and Country General Manager.

"We are grateful to Rajan for his huge contribution to Google over the past eight years. His entrepreneurial zeal and leadership has helped grow the overall internet ecosystem in India and Southeast Asia, and we wish him all the best in his new adventures," said Scott Beaumont, President, Google Asia Pacific in a statement.  

8 amazing years. 850million internet users across India and SEA. Many billions of revenue and fastest growing region in the world. Incredible team that thinks big and executes superbly. Thank you @GoogleIndia #GoogleSEA. Loved every minute.

— Rajan Anandan (@RajanAnandan) April 2, 2019

According to an entrackr report, Anandan will join Sequoia Capital as Managing Director.

"We are thrilled to welcome Rajan Anandan to Sequoia Capital India as a Managing Director. He will join the leadership team at the firm, in addition to the six current Managing Directors, where he will focus on developing Surge into the world's top scale-up program for startups by acting as an investment advisor and mentor to the program's founders," wrote Sequoia's Shailendra J Singh in a LinkedIn post.

"Surge aims to engineer rapid early progress for startups, by enabling disproportionate access to capital, talent, network and decades of company-building knowledge. Rajan's deep understanding of technology, significant operating expertise and track record of growing tech businesses across the region will help Surge founders scale and build the transformational businesses of tomorrow," he added.

(With inputs from Reuters)