Vijay Shekhar Sharma (born 7 June 1978) is an Indian technology entrepreneur and multimillionaire business magnate. He is the founder chairman, and managing director of One97 Communications founded in 1997 and its consumer brand Paytm which he started in 2010.[1][2][3][4]
Vijay Shekhar Sharma was born in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh on 7 June 1978, the third of the four children of Sulom Prakash Sharma, a school teacher, and Asha Sharma, a homemaker.[7][8] He did his schooling from Harduaganj, a small town near Aligarh.[9] He enrolled in college at the age of 15 and graduated with a B.Tech degree from the Delhi College of Engineering (now Delhi Technological University) at 19 years old [10][11][12]
Careeredit
In 1997, while in college, he started the website indiasite.net, and sold it two years later for US$1 million.[13][14] Three years later, in 2000, he started One97 Communications [15] which offered mobile content including news, cricket scores, ringtones, jokes and exam results.[14]One97 Communications Limited is the parent company of Paytm, a digital payments and financial services company that was launched by Sharma in 2010.[16] In November 2021, Paytm went public raising $2.5 billion at a valuation of $19 billion, making it India's largest initial public offering at that time.[17]
In 2024, Sharma stepped down from his role as part-time non-executive chairman and board member of Paytm Payments Bank. This decision followed regulatory challenges encountered by the bank with the Reserve Bank of India.[21][22]
Awards and recognitionedit
Won the Best Serial Entrepreneur Award at the Rural and Urban Development Summit and Awards 2022 presented by the Minister of State for the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Government of India.[23]
Ranked the Youngest Indian Billionaire by Forbes magazine [24]
In 2018, he was named the Entrepreneur of the Year by AIMA [25]
In September 2015, he was named CEO of the Year by SABRE Award.[36]
Personal lifeedit
He is married to Mridula Parashar Sharma[37] and they have a child.[38] He cites Alibaba's founder Jack Ma and Masayoshi Son of Softbank, as his inspirations.[39] In February 2022, Sharma was arrested by Delhi police for hitting his car into the car of a police officer. He was later released on bail.[40]
Other workedit
Sharma has been named as the UN Environment's 'Patron for Clean Air', where he helps to drive environmental action and awareness and advocate for the goals of United Nations Environment's global Breathe Life campaign.[41][42]
^"The 100 Most Influential People in the World". Time. Retrieved 2 April 2020.
^"ET Awards for Corporate Excellence: Paytm's Vijay Shekhar Sharma chosen as Entrepreneur of the Year". Economic Times. Retrieved 3 October 2016.
^"GQ's Most Influential Young Indians 2017: Digital Disruptors". GQ (Indian edition). 7 July 2017.
^Sacchdeva, Malavika (6 March 2017). "Vijay Shekhar Sharma to be awarded as DQ IT Person of the Year at Digital Economy Conclave". Dataquest.
^"Airtel's Sunil Mittal, Paytm's Vijay Shekar given honorary degrees by Amity University". DNA INDIA.com.
^"Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma goes to meet UP CM Akhilesh Yadav ... in a rickshaw!". The Economic Times. 28 October 2016.
^"GQ Awards 2016 winners list". India.com. 28 September 2016.
^"NDTV confers Indian of the Year Award 2015". United News of India. 3 February 2016.
^"Vijay Shekhar Sharma wins IMPACT Person of The Year 2016 Award". Exchange4media. 14 December 2016.
^"India's Hottest Business Leaders under 40: Paytm's Vijay Shekhar Sharma was the youngest engineer from Delhi University". The Economic Times. 19 June 2015.
^"Sabre Awards South Asia". Bestmediainfo. 21 September 2015.
^Upadhyay, Harsh; Tyagi, Gaurav (2 July 2020). "Paytm founder floats 2 new entities for personal investments". Entrackr.
^"Forbes profile: Vijay Sekhar Sharma". Forbes. Retrieved 9 February 2021.
^"Vijay Sharma, Paytm: an for India". Financial Times.
^IANS (13 March 2022). "Paytm CEO was released on bail in Feb after hitting police officer's car". Business Standard India. Retrieved 14 March 2022.
^"Paytm's Vijay Shekhar Sharma named UN Environment's Patron for Clean Air". The Economic Times. 5 December 2017.