All the Rajus at Satyam

By Shalini Amarnani
08 January 2009

Raju (pronounced raadzjoo, meaning king), is the name of a small but prominent community in Andhra Pradesh that is considered to have descended from a lineage of ancient kings. Rajus today are concentrated in Godavari district, but they have some traditions of the Krishna district. 

Satyam Computers is littered with Rajus. One of the reasons the company has such strong support of its staff has been the close community connection.

Although B Ramalinga Raju has been the face of Satyam Computers, the IT company was actually founded in June 1977 as a private company by Raju along with his brother B Rama Raju and brother-in-law D V S Raju.
 
In June 1991, Satyam Computers bagged its first Fortune 500 client and its first offshore contract from US tractor maker John Deere & Co and in August, it became a public limited company. In May 1992, the company entered capital markets with its issue being oversubscribed 17 times.

By 1992, the major shareholders had a difference of opinion over the issue of investing Satyam's money in other sister concerns - Satyam Spinning Mills and Satyam Constructions - and parted ways after a peace deal was brokered between them.

According to the deal, D V S Raju had to quit the company that he co-founded and had to face a three-year bar on starting another IT company of his own.

After three years, D V S Raju started VisualSoft, which was later merged with Applabs. He now heads Gangavaram Port Ltd at Visakhapatnam.