Washington CIO Shyam
By Asha

While some Indian techies and VC’s have done spectacularly well in USA, today there was another announcement of an IIT educated Techie joining the top echelons of Government in USA

Washington Governor Gregoire has appointed Bharat Shyam as the State’s Chief Information Officer

“I am incredibly impressed with Bharat,” Gregoire said. “With nearly 20 years of experience at Microsoft, he brings a deep understanding of software and technology. And his level of enthusiasm for the position is unmatched. I welcome him to this role, and know the citizens of Washington State will benefit from his service.”

“I’m honored and humbled to serve the people of Washington State as part of Governor Gregoire’s team,” Shyam said. “I adopted Washington as my home two decades ago and my family has benefited enormously from working and living in this state. That’s why I’m thrilled to give back by ensuring we spend money wisely on information technology. Home to some of the most vibrant IT companies, combined with rapid change in IT and a dedicated state workforce – Washington State has the potential to be the best government in the world when it comes to information technology. I intend to use our state assets – and make our state nimble while delivering the best services to citizens at the lowest costs.”

While at Microsoft, Shyam successfully reduced costs of software publishing and servicing, while delivering higher quality and a more agile system. He began his career at Microsoft in 1993 as a software design engineer, developing early prototypes of one of the nation’s first smartphones. He later became a lead software engineer for Internet Explorer and Windows 98 and 2000, and was a creator of the billing system for several services in Microsoft – including XBOX Live. He most recently served as General Manager for Windows Azure.

Shyam earned a degree in computer science and engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay, India before attending Stanford University, where he graduated with a master’s of science in computer science in 1993.