By Anurag Kumar
Copyright timesnownews
As the United States moves to tighten visa regulations, raising concerns for Indian tech professionals who are major beneficiaries of the H-1B program, two leading US tech companies have bucked the trend by appointing Indian-origin CEOs. The move holds significance as Trump recently signed a new executive order that now imposes a $100,000 fee on all H-1B visa applications. T-Mobile, the US telecom giant, will see Srinivas “Srini” Gopalan, 55, take over as CEO on November 1. An alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad, Gopalan currently serves as T-Mobile’s Chief Operating Officer and will succeed Mike Sievert, who has led the company since 2020 and will transition to the newly created role of vice chairman. “I’m deeply honoured to take on the role of T-Mobile’s next chief executive officer. I’ve long been in awe of what this company has achieved — fearlessly reinventing wireless to serve customers in ways no one thought possible,” Gopalan said in a LinkedIn post. Who Is Srinivas Gopalan? Srinivas Gopalan’s career spans multiple continents and industries. He began as a management trainee at Hindustan Unilever and went on to hold senior positions at Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Capital One, and Deutsche Telekom, where he doubled growth, expanded fiber networks to millions of homes, and captured record mobile market share in Germany. At T-Mobile, he has led the Technology, Consumer, and Business divisions, driving initiatives in 5G, AI, and digital transformation. Sievert described Gopalan as “highly skilled, passionate, and incredibly knowledgeable,” adding that he had full confidence in Gopalan’s ability to “take our employee and customer experience to the next level.” Meanwhile, Chicago-based beverage giant Molson Coors announced Rahul Goyal, 49, as its new president and CEO, effective October 1. Goyal succeeds Gavin Hattersley, who will remain in an advisory role through the end of the year. Goyal has spent 24 years with the company. Who Is Rahul Goyal? A native of India, Goyal studied engineering in Mysore before moving to the US for business studies in Denver, and has worked across Coors and Molson brands in the US, UK, and India. “After an extensive CEO succession process, it was clear Rahul brought the right experience and vision to drive our next phase of growth,” said David Coors, chairman of Molson Coors’ board. Goyal said he was ready to meet challenges head-on while carrying forward the company’s legacy. These appointments come amid increasing political scrutiny over foreign-born employees, whom MAGA hardliners sometimes portray as “globalists” taking American jobs. Yet Indian-origin leaders continue to helm some of America’s most influential companies, following in the footsteps of Satya Nadella at Microsoft, Sundar Pichai at Alphabet, and others in Fortune 500 firms.
