1988 - B.Tech - Computer Science Senior VP @ Walmart Global eCommerce and Head of WalmartLabs
Dr. Venky Harinarayan obtained his B.Tech in Computer Science from IIT Madras in 1988 and went on to do his Ph.D. in Computer Science at Stanford, USA.
Venky is an investor, entrepreneur and leader in search and e-commerce. He is the co-founder of Cambrian Ventures and Kosmix. He also co-founded Junglee Corp., which pioneered Internet comparison shopping. Junglee was acquired by Amazon.com Inc. in 1998. Venky helped to create Amazon.com’s marketplace business, which was a disruptive and controversial idea that had never been done before. Marketplace is currently Amazon.com’s most profitable and fastest-growing business. Venky was also the inventor of the concept underlying Amazon.com’s Mechanical Turk. He helped create search advertising startup Efficient Frontier, and is a Board member and founding investor. Efficient Frontier is among the largest search-engine and social-media marketing agencies. It applies advanced portfolio management theory to online advertising.
Venky has authored multiple technical papers, one of which received the ACM SIGMOD’s best award in 1996 and also received the 2006 ACM SIGMOD Test of Time Award.
Venky is an active angel investor in India and Silicon Valley. He is one of less than 5 angel investors in facebook. He is also a Board member in TutorVista, based out of Bangalore, which has been acquired by Person LLC in 2001.
In recognition of Dr. Venky Harinarayan’s pioneering contributions and innovations in the field of e-commerce, IIT Madras and its alumni are proud to confer on him this award.
