Pichai gets $199m stocks, highest for a Google exec

Google’s Sundar Pichai is poised to become one of the highest-paid executives of a publicly traded company this year after parent Alphabet awarded him restricted stock worth about $199 million.
Pichai, who is Google’s chief executive officer, received 273,328 Class C shares on February 3 that will vest in quarterly increments through 2019 if he remains on the job, according to a filing on Friday from the Mountain View, California-based company.
Pichai, the former deputy of Google co-founder Larry Page, was named to run the search engine unit following the reorganization into holding company Alphabet last year. The award is the biggest ever given to aGoogle executive officer whose equity grants have to be reported in filings, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It is Pichai’s first award since taking over the company’s highestgrossing unit.
Alphabet also awarded $42.8 million in restricted stock to Diane Greene, a co-founder and former CEO of software maker VMware, who’s led Google’s cloud business since November. Greene received equity worth $148 million last year after Google acquired tech company Bebop Technologies, which she founded.
Chief financial officer Ruth Porat, who joined from Morgan Stanley last year, received equity worth $38.3 million that will vest under the same conditions as Pichai’s award, a filing shows. An Alphabet spokesman didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. BLOOMBERG