Sundar Pichai (Photo: AP)

Indian techies often change their names when they start working in the US and so did P. Sundararajan, but not all become Sundar Pichai.

The 43-year-old new CEO, who expanded his initials and shortened his name after shifting to the US, began his career with Google in 2004 as a “low-key” manager and colleagues say there is no single Googler who did not like him.

From working on the Google toolbar, to the very successful Chrome browser, Mr Pichai, an IIT-Kharagpur graduate became a clear number-two to the then CEO Larry Page last year. While at Google, he also refused a job offer from Twitter, the popular social media platform which was on Tuesday flooded with posts to congratulate him.

Born and raised in Chennai, Mr Pichai did B.Tech from IIT-Kharagpur and then went on to pursue MS from Stanford University, and an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania and joined Google in 2004.