50-year-old Radha Vembu currently stands as the third richest Indian woman. She is also currently the richest self-made woman in India, a spot previously held by the likes of Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw and Falguni Nayar.
Vembu has a net worth of $2.6 crore or about Rs 21,455 crore, as per Forbes’ real-time rich list. This makes her the 1176th richest person in the world. Vembu’s riches come from her massive stake in the Indian multi-billion multinational company Zoho Corp. The privately held software firm was founded by Vembu and her brothers. Radha Vembu is the largest stakeholder in the company.
Born in 1972, Radha Vembu’s father used to work in Madras High Court as a stenographer. She studied from the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras and earned a degree in industrial management.
It was while she was still studying that she founded the business with other people including brothers Sridhar Vembu and Sekar Vembu, as its precursor Adventnet back in 1996. Sridhar is the well-known face of the company while Sekar keeps a low profile.
Radha Vembu heads a team of around 250 people as Zoho Mail’s product manager. She is based in Chennai which also houses one of the main offices of Zoho, which has its 375-acre headquarters in Austin, Texas.
The company reportedly has over 6 crore users and is based in nine countries across the globe. Zono, which is known for its cloud-based business software, is currently also beta testing a WhatsApp rival called ‘Arattai’, the Tamil word for chat.
Radha is also the director of an agricultural NGO called Janaki Hi-Tech Agro Pvt Ltd, as well as a real-estate company called Highland Valley Corporation Pvt Ltd. She is married and has a child.
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