Sridhar Vembu says 'smart well-educated Indians' are gravitating to finance: 'This is not good'

Clarifying his stand, Sridhar Vembu added, 'My post is more addressed towards policy makers and successful entrepreneurs so that 'they' don't fall for the seduction of finance and realise the need to nurture long-term R&D and deep tech.'

Zoho co-founder and Padma Shri awardee Sridhar Vembu has said that he has noticed a growing trend among well-educated Indians that he does not approve of. Taking to X, he wrote that young professionals are currently attracted to high finance or the idea of making money on money. "This is not good," he said.

"Smart Indian-American children, whose parents work in engineering or tech, are moving to high finance. This mirrors what smart Americans have done for well over a generation," Vembu wrote on X. Drawing from his personal experience, the Zoho chief scientist added, "When I got my PhD from Princeton in 1994, a former engineer from Silicon Valley, who moved to a Wall Street job, tried to persuade me to join their quantitative analysis and trading team and I instead took a lower paying job as an engineer at Qualcomm. I did not find the idea of making money on money appealing - probably my father's admonition from childhood."

Vembu said that recently he noticed smart well-educated Indians gravitating to finance. "This is not good. We need to apply our talents to solve hard engineering and tech problems, hard urban and rural infrastructure problems, hard health care problems and so on," he said, adding that while making money on money feels easy, a finance-driven economy would destroy society. "This is ancient wisdom, and we must pay heed," Vembu added.

His perspective found several takers on X.

An Indian manufacturer based in Hong Kong, Prakash Dadlani, said, "With 30 years in manufacturing and import/export, one piece of advice from my dad has always stuck with me: Don’t just make money - create something that matters. I never believed in making money off money alone. That’s why every day, I wake up with one goal: to build something that adds real value to society."

Vembu replied, "Awesome! This is what we need!"

Responding to another X user on how engineering graduates with liabilities like a house, car, and marriage, would prioritise their love for engineering over higher-paying jobs, the Zoho boss said, "Individual engineers, scientists or mathematicians do indeed face a difficult choice in saying no to the seductive allure of Wall Street. The money is mind-boggling."

Further clarifying his stand, Vembu added, "My post is more addressed towards policymakers and successful entrepreneurs so that 'they' don't fall for the seduction of finance and realise the need to nurture long-term R&D and deep tech. Talent will come to R&D if successful entrepreneurs and policymakers signal its importance with the commitment of money and strong words of encouragement."