The CEO of a company is the most influential person in the corporation. Certainly, the highest paid as this list suggests. But that amount is justified given the amount of work they put in to improve the business and the innovative ideas and strategies they develop to bring their enterprise forward in the market. The centerpiece of everything tech related, the place where the revolution started and one of the best TV shows of HBO, Silicon Valley is the place where companies having the potential to change the world belong. Let’s have a peek at the highest paid CEOs working in Silicon Valley.
1. Satya Nadella
Easily the most prevailing company in the Silicon Valley. Microsoft is the king of the jungle, and Satya Nadella is its CEO, making him more significant and formidable. Satya Nadella has an Indian Origin and is the highest paid CEO in Silicon Valley. His income is in upwards of $84 million, mainly thanks to the stock compensation package he receives. His tremendous job in bringing Microsoft back to its former glory is very commendable.
2. Steve Mollenkopf
Steve is the CEO of Qualcomm, an establishment which is considered the world leader in next-gen mobile technologies and 3G. He has already been working with the firm for 20 years before being promoted to the CEO position, earning him an income of nearly $60 million. He has been a crucial part of the business and was the COO, supervising the investments in 3G and 4G products, before the call from above.
3. Marissa Mayer
Remember Yahoo? The one-stop destination for all the information before Google came around? A company which was once worth a $100 billion, was set to be a part of Verizon Group for just $4.83 billion. This shows the decline in business. The task of bringing back Yahoo from the bottom has been handed over to Marissa Mayer, a former Google employee, since 2012. She is well paid for her efforts too, nearly $42 million.
4. Marc Benioff
Marc Benioff needs no introduction. A man who is loved all over the valley and a very dominant CEO, Marc Benioff is the also the founder and chairman of Salesforce, a large cloud computing company. Apart from the $3 billion worth of stock he has, Marc also gets a salary of $39 million for his role as the Chief Executive Officer.
5. Brian Roberts
Brian Roberts earns around $32 million as the CEO of Comcast. Comcast is the biggest broadcasting and cable television corporation in the entire world when it comes regarding revenue and also the largest provider of internet in the US. Brian took over the role in 2014, after the founder of Comcast, his father, Ralph J. Roberts.
6. David Cote
Honeywell International Inc. is a large conglomerate, which produces all sorts of products from home appliances to aerospace systems. Its CEO, David M. Cote, who earns around $29 million per year is a very experienced competitor. His resume consists of working for General Electric for two decades and as the president and COO of TRW for thirteen years before that.
7. Randall Stephenson
A competitor of Comcast, AT&T rules the telecommunication market in the world. It is also the 12th largest company regarding market value, revenue, assets, and profits. It, however, loses to Comcast when it comes to paying their CEO. Randall Stephenson earns around $23 million each year. Randall has been at the helm of AT&T since 2007, portraying the role of CEO and Chairman.
8. Ursula M. Burns
The story of Ursula M. Burns is totally inspiring. She is one of the top 25 most powerful women in the world according to Forbes. Ursula first started working as a summer intern in 1980 at Xerox. She then worked her way up by working very hard. She became the first African-American to become CEO of a Fortune 500 company by replacing another woman, Anne Mulcahy, being the first woman ever to do so. The salary of $22 million seems a little less for this strong woman.
9. Virginia Rometty
A story quite similar like that of Ursula’s, Virginia started her career in IBM back in 1982 when IBM was turning heads everywhere with its technologies and products of the future. She has been the CEO of the company since 2012 and culminated nearly $19.3 million in the last fiscal year.
10. Meg Whitman
A total all-in-all woman. Meg is a graduate of both Princeton and Harvard. She worked as an executive in The Walt Disney Company, DreamWorks, Procter & Gamble, and Hasbro before becoming the CEO of eBay for a decade since 1998. In that period, she expanded the company from 30 employees and $4 million annual revenue to 15,000 employees and $8 billion annual revenue. She has been the CEO of HP since 2011 now and earned around $19 million a year.
