Tech

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai earned $226 million last year, making him one of the world's best-paid bosses

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai
Sundar Pichai became Alphabet CEO in 2019. Jerod Harris/Getty Images
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Alphabet's Sundar Pichai was paid a total of $226 million last year after he was awarded a big tranche of shares, making him one of America's best-paid CEOs.

The chief executive of Google's owner was given more than $218 million, according to filings published Friday. His base annual salary of $2 million hasn't changed since 2020

Pichai is awarded shares every three years and took home more than $280 million in 2019, the year cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin officially stepped down from their executive roles. 

Alphabet also spent almost $6 million on personal security for Pichai, according to the filing. 

Other executives, including senior vice president of Google's knowledge and information, Prabhakar Raghavan, and chief business officer Philipp Schindler both made about $37 million, per the filing. They are awarded shares annually.

Pichai's compensation makes him one of the world's best-paid CEOs. The timing is awkward following layoffs at Alphabet as well as other companies in the tech sector such as Meta and Twitter.

Alphabet cut 12,000 jobs in January and Pichai said in a memo he was taking "full responsibility for the decisions that led us here."

"Over the past two years we've seen periods of dramatic growth," he wrote. "To match and fuel that growth, we hired for a different economic reality than the one we face today."

Pichai said the company had undertaken a "rigorous review" and that jobs were being cut across all "product areas, functions, levels and regions."

Apple CEO Tim Cook asked to have his pay cut for 2023 after huge packages in previous years caused controversy among shareholders. He is set to earn $49 million, about 40% less than in 2022.

Elon Musk was arguably the best-paid boss last year after selling shares in Tesla worth almost $23 billion to help fund his takeover of Twitter. The CEO doesn't take a salary or bonus from the EV maker.

Alphabet didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider, made outside normal working hours.

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Sam Tabahriti reports on trending business news from the London bureau. He frequently covers tech, such as Apple, Twitter, Meta, and Google as well as transportation. Sam is particularly interested in investigating tech companies.  He received his BA in Journalism from the University of Westminster.  Before joining Insider, Sam worked for BBC, The Sunday Times Magazine, talkRADIO, Metro, and more.  Reach out You can get in touch with him by email at stabahriti@bjinnox.com or stabahriti@proton.me securely. He is also available via Twitter @samtabahriti or Instagram @samtbrt. WhatsApp, Signal, or Telegram available upon request.  Top stories A SpaceX technician suffered a fractured skull during a routine rocket test in January and was placed in a coma A 62-year old engineer alleges he was sidelined at SpaceX over fears that he might 'retire or die' Rich Russians offered a Caribbean shortcut to US visas by paying their way to a Grenadian passport Dozens of seized superyachts may cause significant environmental damage if governments fail to pay millions in maintenance costs, experts say Russian oligarchs have been sanctioned like Osama bin Laden was, and they're using similar tactics to avoid them, an expert said Russian oligarchs anticipated sanctions months before the war and moved money through Hawala, an informal payment system, an expert says