Vijay Shekhar Sharma Biography
Born and raised third of four children in a class of constant economic hardship and struggle, Vijay Shekhar Sharma would notice, even at 12 years old, the inequities of the world, watching his classmates, or batchmates, unable to afford simple chappal, or slippers, to wear to school. He even wrote a poem on the subject at the time, paving the way for the compassionate nature for which he’s renowned today.
Due to his modest upbringing, Vijay Shekhar Sharma never had the opportunity to learn and develop his English. So, he taught it to himself by listening to rock music. He still loves attending live rock and roll concerts to this day.
At the young Vijay Shekhar Sharma age of 27, he was earning only Rs 10,000 per month and, so, was considered an ineligible bachelor. So, he decided to attend college to learn engineering, making him one of only two people from his village to pursue the career. Due to his poor education in his younger years, he had to work hard in higher education just to keep up.
He would describe how learning would be like watching a dubbed Bollywood movie, where the characters’ words didn’t match the movements of their lips. He would memorize the answers to questions without understanding the meaning of the questions themselves. In ways like these, he overcame his challenges learning and earned his B. Tech from what’s now Delhi Technological University but was then called Delhi College of Engineering.
Decades later, entrepreneur Vijay Shekhar Sharma is responsible for creating one of the world’s premier fintech firms dealing with wallet-based payments and digital payments. His age at the March 2022 time of this writing is 43 years old.
Paytm
In August of 2010, he founded the Indian startup company Paytm, an e-wallet and one of the first mobile wallets in the world. The name of the company Paytm Vijay Shekhar Sharma founded is an acronym for “Pay through mobile.”
In 2016, Paytm benefited greatly from India’s demonetization, amassing 400 million users and facilitating 25 million transactions per day.
In August 2018, multitudes more people started hearing about him after he managed to convince the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and Oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffet, to make a $300-million investment in Paytm.
He has already expanded Paytm to include the ecommerce business Paytm Mall and the Paytm Payments Bank.
The Personal Side of Vijay Shekhar Sharma
Personality and Character of Vijay Shekhar Sharma
Any Vijay Shekhar Sharma biography will note that, despite being a self-made man, coming from a small town and building an empire through sheer passion and determination, he is nevertheless a self-effacing and modest man who never forgot his humble beginnings.
Known within and outside of his business for both his resilience and kindness, his motivational public speeches are famous for their genuine, sincere and heartfelt nature.
Interesting Facts About Vijay Shekhar Sharma
One fun fact not often reported in the news on him is that he dreams of forming a band performing in the language Sanskrit, which he learned in school.
Vijay Shekhar Sharma Accomplishments and Accolades
In 2015, The Economic Times recognized him as the Hottest Business Leader in India under 40 years old. The very next year, the same magazine named him ET Entrepreneur of the Year. Also in 2016, he was named NDTV Indian of the Year and he received the Businessman of the Year title at the year’s GQ Men of the Year Awards. Also that year, Vijay Shekhar Sharma received an Honorary Doctorate degree from Amity University, Gurgaon, Time Magazine named him one of the most influential people of the year and he earned that year’s Dataquest IT Man title.
Among the latest news on he is that, in 2020, he was ranked 62nd among India’s richest people. In 2021, Vijay Shekhar Sharma ranked 92nd on Forbes’ list of India’s Richest people and 1,362nd on Forbes’ list of billionaires.
He was also granted the highest civilian award from the Uttar Pradesh government, the Yash Bharati award.
FAQ
He is married to Mridula Sharma, an associate professor, researcher and academic at Macquarie University. They have one child.
He was born to schoolteacher Sulom Prakash and homemaker Asha Sharma in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, a small North India city. Vijay Shekhar Sharma currently resides in Delhi, India.
As of March 3, 2022, Vijay Shekhar Sharma net worth is approximately $2.5 billion, according to Forbes, making him the second-youngest billionaire in India. This is nearly double his approximate $1.3 billion net worth just five years earlier in 2017, when he was considered India’s youngest billionaire.
Known primarily as an entrepreneur he is a self-made leader in the growing financial technology, or FinTech, industry. While he has 38 companies in his portfolio, his primary role is as Founder and CEO of Paytm. Also an angel investor and investment partner, he is currently invested in 47 different companies, such as Evenflow, Healofy, Leverage Edu and Vahan.
Vijay Shekhar Sharma’s career began in 1997 when he founded indiasite.net . Two years later, he sold it for $1 million, later, in 2000, founding One97 Communications, Paytm’s parent company.
