President & Chief Executive Officer (Board Member), Nutanix, Inc.
From IIT Madras to CEO of Nutanix | Rajiv Ramaswami on Leadership, AI & Cloud Innovation
Join Rajiv Ramaswami, CEO of Nutanix and distinguished IIT Madras alumnus, in the Leadership Lecture Series for an inspiring ...
About Rajiv Ramaswami
Rajiv Ramaswami, CEO of Nutanix, delivered the opening keynote at a company event in Chicago on July 7, 2026, where he discussed the company's platform roadmap and the impact of agentic AI. During the keynote, he described hypothetical AI agents for personal tasks such as regulating metabolism, expediting airport security, and managing email. In a conversation with a customer from the casino industry, Ramaswami noted that the customer planned to open a new resort using Nutanix's hypervisor and management tools, and that the customer's CEO was driving AI adoption across guest-facing experiences, personalization, and operational efficiency. Ramaswami also criticized VMware and Broadcom, stating that Broadcom is "forcing you to buy the full stack" and "capturing the maximum amount of profits," and urged customers to consider whether that is where they want to invest. He added that Nutanix aims to help customers "reduce your dependence" on such vendors and "meet your current and future needs with a modern platform." On the company's Q3 2026 earnings call on May 26, 2026, Ramaswami said Nutanix sees demand driven by businesses modernizing IT, adopting hybrid cloud models, and deploying cloud-native applications including AI. He noted that AMD recently invested up to $250 million in Nutanix and that the companies are working on joint solutions with AMD GPUs. Regarding hardware supply, Ramaswami stated that lead times for appliance vendors range from a few weeks to six months depending on configuration and vendor, and that Nutanix expects hardware prices to remain elevated into fiscal year 2027. He also attributed a higher average contract duration in Q3 to a mix of larger, longer-duration transactions across land, expand, and renewals.
Transcript (52 segments)
M
Mahesha0:05
Okay. So it's my pleasure to introduce myself. I'm Mahesha from Nutanix, based out of Bangalore. I would like to introduce Rajiv, who is the CEO of Nutanix and an alumnus of IIT Madras from the 1986 batch. He's been the CEO of Nutanix for over five years. After his BTech from IIT Madras, he did his masters and PhD from UC Berkeley in electrical engineering. We are associating ourselves with IIT Madras through CSR contributions to fund scholarships, support the data center equipment, and research grants. As part of that, we had a hackathon and we want to announce the winners and have Rajiv share his thoughts on technology and Nutanix. We'll have Q&A with prizes, and at the end we'll have pizzas. I also introduce my colleagues: Faz, VP of sales and marketing; Shiva, director of R&D and an IIT Madras alumnus; Shri Ram, head of talent acquisition; and Sapna. We have a strong track record in hiring from IIT Madras. We hope to come back in November for placements. So over to Rajiv.
R
Rajiv Ramaswami3:46
As you can imagine, I'm also from Chennai, this is my native place. Coming out of IIT Madras, you get a lot of confidence and the ability to take on risk. Now is the time early in your careers to take on risk and try different things. The world keeps changing. When I graduated 40 years ago, there was very little in India. Most of us went to the US for grad school. But that story has changed. There's so much opportunity in India now. Nutanix does its leading-edge work out of India. Our lead engineering teams are in Bangalore and Pune. We provide the software layer between hardware and applications, like the Android of business applications. We are not a household name like Microsoft, but we are leaders in our segment. We compete for talent with the big companies. I encourage you to explore careers at Nutanix. But you're probably thinking about what to do after graduation. So let's have questions.
M
Mahesha7:26
Go ahead. Nobody? Everybody wants to get their pizza so quickly.
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Rajiv Ramaswami7:32
You only get your pizzas after a few questions.
M
Mahesha7:35
The number of places depend on the number of questions.
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Rajiv Ramaswami7:39
Yeah. Go ahead.
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Rashin Kumar Bowskar7:44
First of all, thank you for this opportunity. I have two questions. First, why are electrical people always CEOs and founders? Second, with the geopolitical situation between US and India, many talented people go to the US. Why don't those people raise their voice or come back to India?
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Rajiv Ramaswami8:07
Yeah.
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Rashin Kumar Bowskar8:11
And carry forward their career.
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Rajiv Ramaswami8:12
Yeah.
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Rashin Kumar Bowskar8:14
But why don't they do something about it? They have power there, they can raise their voice or come back to India.
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Rajiv Ramaswami8:23
Very good questions. What's your name?
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Rashin Kumar Bowskar8:29
I'm Rashin Kumar Bowskar from the MAC department, first year.
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Rajiv Ramaswami8:33
Fantastic. On the first one, there's no correlation between EE or CS and becoming a CEO. It's about taking opportunities. A few life lessons: always have a learning mindset. Learning never stops. For example, when I became CEO, I had to learn how to do live TV interviews. I also had to learn about generative AI. Second, build your network. Every job I got was through my network. For this CEO job, a tennis buddy who was an early investor in Nutanix connected me. Build mentors and sponsors. Also, hire the best talent around you, people better than you. Now on your question about the US: it puts me in an uncomfortable place. The US was the land of opportunity, but now it's becoming less friendly. That means phenomenal opportunity for India. Companies like us will hire more in India. Many people will come back. It's still early days; we'll see how the situation develops.
A
Audience Member14:48
Stand up comedian from Bangalore.
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Rajiv Ramaswami14:51
Yeah, we had her for an event. She said one of the best things to happen to India is Trump. Because companies like us will hire more here. Many good people will come back. It's a good thing for India. In terms of why people aren't complaining, it's a challenging environment. Laws keep changing. We'll see how it rolls out.
M
Mahesha16:29
Yes. Go ahead.
A
Audience Member16:32
Yeah, pass the mic. I have two questions. As someone who passed out from IIT Madras 39 years ago, can you walk us through your career and key learning points? And as a CEO, what do you look for apart from core skills in someone you hire?
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Rajiv Ramaswami17:05
Let me answer the second question first. I look for people who are hungry. They have the drive, ambition, and are go-getters. They take initiative and don't expect to be spoonfed. When I hire, I look for potential and what they achieved in their last role. I ask about their impact and how they measured it. For the first question about my career: I did grad school at Berkeley, which was tough. I had a PhD qualifying exam where a professor asked what happens when the world goes to absolute zero. He wanted to see how I think from first principles. I got my master's and joined IBM research. I had a great mentor who was a famous scientist. He became my PhD advisor and lifelong mentor. I was lucky to have him. So key points: always be learning, build your network, hire great talent.
A
Audience Member17:13
Hungry for?
R
Rajiv Ramaswami17:14
Hungry. They want to do more, take on more. Not hungry for pizzas. They have the drive. So I look for people who are hungry.
That as my first manager opened a lot of doors. He promoted me and gave me exposure in the industry. I was a research guy, publishing papers and patents, and we built one of the first commercial systems in that area in the '90s. After he retired, I took over the group and moved to Silicon Valley during the optical networking boom. I joined a startup as employee number three, but within a year we got acquisition offers. I convinced the team to take a $3.5 billion stock offer from Norts instead of a $1.5 billion cash offer. The company went bankrupt, and the stock went to zero. That taught me to diversify and that cash is king. I then moved to Cisco and shifted from a technical role to a general manager, which was a big career change. After that, I ran various business units and now run a company.
M
Mahesha27:44
All right. Interesting. What do you say? That's okay. You can take it. Come on. I think he cares more about what this is about. What is it? It's a nice pair of headsets, man. Wow. If I had known this, I would have joined the hackathon, too. Yeah. Enjoy it. How many of these do you have, man? You have a whole collection of these.
R
Rajiv Ramaswami28:11
We have 10.
M
Mahesha28:12
Oh, okay. So, 10 questions will get this. Oh, now there's going to be competition for question asking. Look at that. All right. Okay. Go ahead.
A
Audience Member28:33
What are your memories?
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Rajiv Ramaswami28:36
Lots of them. It's all about the people you work with. I've had great colleagues, some lifelong friends. The current CEO of IBM is a close friend. Best memories are time spent with people. Also milestones like building the first commercial product in optical networking. At Nutanix, we've come a long way in five years, and it's fulfilling to shape the future.
M
Mahesha30:16
Yeah. Go down back there. I know there's a lot of questions. Yes. Go back there.
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Rajiv Ramaswami30:31
Her question was how important is passion for technology and how to increase it. I work because I enjoy it. Life is too short to waste. Do what you enjoy. It's personal. Don't waste your life doing things you don't want to do. My kids have a more clinical approach. For me, passion has been the driving force.
M
Mahesha32:46
There are a lot of questions. Oh my god. Okay, go ahead. Yeah, go ahead. Okay, you got the mic first. Go and you can go next. Yeah.
A
Audience Member32:53
My question is what do you see as the future technical leaders that will define the current AI revolution, and how was Nutanix able to survive when there was already a global leader in cloud architecture?
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Rajiv Ramaswami33:12
Both good questions. On AI, find the right use cases and compelling value propositions. Technology for its own sake doesn't matter. Convert potential into strong business use cases. For Nutanix, we are in the leader quadrant for distributed cloud alongside Google, AWS, Microsoft. We have a challenger mindset, hire top talent, obsess about customers. Our net promoter score has been 90 for 10 years, top of the industry. We architect for usability and support customers well. We are market share leader in India.
M
Mahesha37:13
Okay, there are some questions here. I think lady back here. Yeah.
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Rajiv Ramaswami37:30
Look, there's no right or wrong. Money is important but don't anchor 100% on it. If someone pays 10x more, take it. For 10-20% more, weigh growth, learning, interest, people. Early in career, anchor on learning and growth. For startups, it requires a certain DNA. Join early for potential big money, but high failure rate. Look for companies with great technology, learning environment, good people, interesting work. You can learn and grow. If you join a startup very early, there's potential to make a lot of money, but also higher risk of failure.
M
Mahesha39:34
Okay. Okay, so somebody else can. Okay, go here Mike.
I'll repeat the question.
The choice.
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Rajiv Ramaswami39:56
The question is how to decide between managerial and technical track. For me, it changed naturally. I started as a researcher, then moved to product, managing teams, sales. The shift to business leader happened opportunistically when I became GM at Cisco. I learned the business side while knowing the technology. Later, I took a job in a different domain, out of my comfort zone, but enjoyed the learning. You don't have to be the expert, but ask the right questions. There's no right or wrong; it depends on your passion.
M
Mahesha43:10
How much time do we have, guys? I think we got two questions. Last two questions. I know we're going to have a raffle. Everybody wants this. All right, I will uh I think I need to go somebody somewhere. All right, go ahead. Over there. Go ahead. Get requested. Yeah, you can get a mic. I'll repeat the question. Go ahead.
R
Rajiv Ramaswami43:36
Ah, so question is you any advice for students who are preparing for internships and jobs from a CEO's perspective? I don't do a lot of intern hiring myself. But I'll tell you, for us as a company, why don't you talk about this, Mahesha?
M
Mahesha43:52
Oh yeah, I think so.
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Rajiv Ramaswami43:55
Yeah, you use my mic.
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Rashin Kumar Bowskar43:59
The question was what we look for in an intern. Basic technical skills and domain understanding go without saying. In interviews, we look for attitude, can-do spirit, intellectual curiosity, humility, hunger to learn, and ability to stretch beyond the obvious. Technical skills in systems technologies like operating systems, file systems, storage, networking, Kubernetes are important. We also do coding tests.
A
Audience Member45:17
Do we do a coding test?
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Rashin Kumar Bowskar45:18
Yeah, we do the coding test. Yeah, it's part of the process.
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Rajiv Ramaswami45:28
College life 40 years ago for me. But the best part of the IT experience was making lifelong friends. We still get together every weekend to play bridge. That was the best experience. Anyway, last question here. I think I'm okay. I'll go here right here. Go ahead.
A
Audience Member46:00
Okay.
So you mentioned that you had to leave your PhD halfway. Yes. So do you ever regret doing that or do you feel that if you had completed your PhD life would have turned out differently?
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Rajiv Ramaswami46:16
I did complete my PhD, but not the way I wanted. My advisor left after two years, and I had to find funding. That was a setback. I got my master's and then found a place at IBM research to continue my PhD. I finished a couple of years later based on work at IBM. I was lucky. I think we got to bring this to a close.
M
Mahesha47:27
I know there are more questions. Sorry, we have to wind up. So we have a little bit of hackathon award-winning prize distribution. So just a few moments of your time. Why don't you do the...
Thanks Rajiv for sharing your inspiring journey and thank you everyone for joining us today. So we're here to celebrate all of you. We had a hackathon recently and we had some phenomenal submissions. We had to pick top three but it wasn't easy. Our judges were amazed by all the real-life solutions that y'all submitted. So we have top three. The first place goes to Rebase Rebel. Congratulations. And second prize goes to Nutales AI. Congratulations guys. And third prize goes to NP not P. Congratulations. I'd also like to quickly call up all the participants to just pick up some goodies from our CEO. So Rakkesh Jawar, thank you.
Thank you everyone for joining us and for your participation. See you again. Bye.