The world is now watching us even more than it was before, ”Parag Agrawal wrote in a message to Twitter on November 29, the day he was appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the microblogging platform.
When Agrawal, 37, succeeds Jack Dorsey – the competitive founder of a competitive company that struggled to keep up with contemporaries like Facebook – the IIT Bombay (IIT-B) alumnus will find himself in the spotlight Be very aware while Twitter is negotiating freedom of expression with governments around the world, including India.
While this is likely the first time Agrawal has come into media attention, he has been a key force on Twitter, as Dorsey himself admitted. “(Parag) has been my choice for some time because he understands the company and its needs very well. Parag stood behind every critical decision that helped turn this company inside out…. I have deep confidence in him as CEO, ”wrote Dorsey, announcing the appointment of Agrawal and his resignation.
Parag, who joined Twitter in 2011 as an engineer and later became the chief technology officer (CTO) of the San Francisco-based company, was responsible for most of the company’s groundbreaking projects, the most successful of which was monetizing the company’s ad-based revenue models. Under Agrawal, the advertising team used machine learning to analyze data and target advertisements to users.
He has also worked to accelerate user growth by improving the relevance of the “home timeline”, revising the company’s technical strategy, and overseeing machine learning and AI across the platform. In 2019, Dorsey relied on Agrawal to start Bluesky, an ambitious Twitter-funded initiative to create decentralized social media where users can apply their own algorithms to moderate and promote content.
While the industry and the media reacted with surprise and curiosity to Agrawal’s appointment, while Twitter’s India timelines were flooded with a flood of “Agarwal ji ka beta” memes, his friends and teachers were not surprised at the meteoric rise of these “brilliant” ”,“ Focused ”,“ creative ”mind – qualities that have brought him to Silicon Valley and on to Twitter.
His wife, Vineeta Agrawala, who has a BS in Biophysics from Stanford University and an MD and PhD from Harvard Medical School / MIT, is a General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, a venture capital company based in Silicon Valley. The couple have a three year old son.
The news of Agrawal’s appointment brought to mind Praveen Tyagi, 47, who was training Agrawal for his Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) – since Agrawal and his friends dropped out of a cycle, they were on their way to “triple” class when the boys drove him accompanied him to the gate when his back pain left him with crutches, up to the gold medal that Agrawal won at the International Physics Olympiad.
“Parag was an intelligent student … has a high JEE rank. He would have done better, but I remember asking for supplementary sheets during his exam and losing valuable time due to a misunderstanding by the examiner, ”said Tyagi.
Dr. Jennifer Widom, Stanford University professor who led Agrawal on his PhD on Incorporating Uncertainty in Data Management and Integration, says his analytical and collaborative skills will help him in his new role on Twitter.
“Parag is incredibly smart and creative. As a doctoral student, he was just as adept with theoretical concepts as he was with building software systems. He was also a wonderful sounding board and collaborator with other students and their research, very generous with his time. He’s also analytical, curious and patient – all of which will be helpful in his new role, “she told the Sunday Express, leaving with advice to the new Twitter CEO:” Don’t lose your fun-loving, easy-going, hearty, down-to-earth personality. You have kept it through many challenging years as CTO and I am counting on you to keep it as CEO. “
Supratim Biswas, professor of computer science and engineering at IIT-B who taught Agrawal, recently said in a video address: “Parag was born in 2001 and graduated from our faculty in 2005. We all know that we only get the best from everyone. ”About India in our department, and to top that it needs a special caliber and Parag definitely had it. He was extremely bright and focused, so it’s no wonder he earned this award at such a young age. In addition, he received the institute’s Young Alumnus Award three years ago, making it in the headlines of the faculty. “
Anand Kumar, now Rector of Atomic Energy Junior College in Mumbai’s eastern suburbs of Anushakti Nagar, where Agrawal was studying, said, “From what I’ve heard from his teachers, he was very intelligent, focused, creative and always to the point. We were very excited (about the appointment) … He will be a topic of conversation when we make speeches in our college to inspire our students. “
Prof. Subhasis Chaudhuri, Director of IIT Bombay, said: “The importance of a university is often measured by the collective performance of its alumni … Parag Agrawal is one of those alumni that the IIT-B is proud of.”
Agrawal’s contemporaries at Stanford University and earlier at IIT-B, where he hung out with friends for hours near Vihar Lake, behind the institute’s # 4 hostel, also speak of him as a fast-learning man.
Devdatta Gangal of Facebook Reality Labs recently wrote a post about Agrawal, his contemporary computer science department at IIT-B, and how their friendship was cemented during Gangal’s frequent visits to Stanford, where his wife was a student, and later after moving to Silicon Valley. “The living room of Parag’s house at 50 Dudley Ln, Stanford, was our unofficial ‘Community Center’ and we chatted, played games, cooked, ate, celebrated Diwali etc. for hours and crashed there. And to use it as a starting point for various treks, hikes and weekend ski trips to Tahoe, ”he wrote before listing Agrawal’s winning traits – that he is well-read, logical, hyper-efficient, clear-minded and that he loves Twitter.
“Parag is familiar with almost every topic that is close to his heart. And there are plenty – sports, finance, Indian and American politics, travel, and, unsurprisingly, consumer electronics and technology. If he doesn’t know something, he quickly says “jyada idea nahi”, “I haven’t followed it lately” and follows with “bata what’s wrong with XYZ” with the right questions to find out more. Maybe that’s what Jack Dorsey meant when he wrote about Parag’s curiosity, ”wrote Gangal.
Vijay Krishnan, CTO of Turing.com, based in Silicon Valley and a graduate of IIT-B and Stanford University, said, “My first intersection with Parag at IIT-B was when we were taking an elective geometric algorithms course. It was taught by a professor who was trying to solve the ‘P vs NP’ problem, which is one of the most difficult open problems in computer science. Only students who did very well in other math and algorithmics classes at IIT would choose it. I remember vividly that Parag seemed to understand the material easily, while most of the others found it difficult and relied on him for questions and explanations after class. “
But one of Agrawal’s greatest challenges awaits in India, where Twitter is increasingly embroiled in the debate over freedom of expression and censorship.
While tensions between the company and the government, which peaked earlier this year, have eased significantly, Agrawal’s appointment is set to further extinguish the fire, according to officials from the Department of Electronics and Information Technology.
“The ministry is about much more than just social media brokers or regulating the internet. We hope that with this (appointment) things will be more positive in the coming times, ”said the official. Twitter India refused to comment on Agrawal’s appointment or role with the company.
Like the current Indian-American tech bosses – including IBM chairman and CEO Arvind Krishna; Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella; Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet; and Adobe Chairman, President and CEO Shantanu Narayen – Agrawal too “needs to be smart and clever in his meetings and dealings with the Indian government,” said an industry manager who worked in Silicon Valley.
However, as CEO of the company, Twitter’s activities in India will only constitute a small fraction of Agrawal’s surveys. He is watched as he steers the company and its policies, focusing on the company’s financial performance and technological innovations.
A great test will also be how he deals with hot topics – including “misinformation” on the platform – in a highly polarized political environment. Around the world, some want Twitter to do more about misinformation and hate speech on the platform, while others have accused it of censorship.
Agrawal got a taste of what to expect when, shortly after his appointment as CEO, an old tweet of him was unearthed by conservatives accusing him of racist bias.
A relatively harmless tweet from him dates back to 2018, when a platform employee quoted him as saying, “For most of the problems you encounter, someone else has encountered a similar problem and has likely come up with a solution, that you can reuse and change or get inspired. So try to be lazy and use these solutions. “
