Poster boy of Internet as he is referred to was born in Bangalore. After schooling from St Joseph’s in Bangalore, he studied for two years at BITS Pilani before getting a CalTech scholarship at the age of 19. He did his BS from California Institute of Technology and masters of science from Stanford University and worked briefly at Firepower Systems. He then joined Apple Computers and it was here that he met Jack Smith and the idea of having a Web-based mail took birth. The duo, frustrated by the company mail system which disallowed private exchange of mails, found a way to interact on the Net freely. The idea also got a fillip from his realization that accessing any software on the Internet via a Web browser was so easy. Thus was born Hotmail which revolutionized the very way people communicated on the Internet. Being a free service, subscribers grew by leaps and bounds and signed 30 million active subscribers before being bought over by Microsoft for $400 million on Dec. 31, 1997. The one liner at the end of each mail "Get Your Private, Free E-mail from Hotmail at www.hotmail.com" had a multiplier effect and there was no looking back. Sadly enough, his next venture Arzoo.com, though innovative, had to shut down its operations. But the legend lives on... the glory of Hotmail refuses to die. n