All about Sriram Krishnan - Indian Techie helping Elon Musk Twitter

With Twitter undergoing rapid change after its takeover, its new owner, Elon Musk, is working with several trusted friends and acquaintances to steady the ship. One of these people inside the "war room" that Musk set up immediately after entering Twitter headquarters is Sriram Krishnan, a venture capitalist and former Twitter employee. Given his connection to Twitter, Sriram is almost an insider helping Musk navigate the company.

Sriram may be crucial to Musk's effort to take complete control of Twitter and turn it into a company that bears his stamp. Musk fired others, mainly Twitter's top management, who could have helped him do it or are leaving en masse. For example, Musk immediately fired its CEO, Parag Agrawal, after buying Twitter. Although, now, with Sriram in his war room, Musk may not miss Parag all that much.

All about Sriram Krishnan

Sriram Krishnan currently works as an investor and partner at the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz -- a16Z. The company is one of the investors in Musk's purchase of Twitter. Krishnan, employed by Twitter from 2017 to 2019, "temporarily" joined a team of troubleshooters to set up a new operation and help Musk revamp the site. The New York Times reports that Krishnan and other executives are laying the groundwork for Musk's Twitter, while Elon Musk, busy and involved as he is, also keep an eye on his other businesses and ventures.

Sharing the details of the new role, Sriram Krishnan posted a photo of Twitter headquarters on Twitter and wrote, "Now that the word is out: I'm helping out @elonmusk with Twitter temporarily with some other great people. I (and a16z) believe this is a hugely important company and can have a great impact on the world, and Elon is the person to make it happen."

According to the employee page of the Andreessen Horowitz website, Sriram Krishan works as a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz and is an investor in budding consumer startups. He has also served on the boards of Bitski, Hopin, and Polywork. Before joining a16z, Sriram Krishnan was part of the core consumer product teams at Twitter, Snap and Facebook. He ran Snap's direct response ad business and Facebook's audience network. Krishnan started his career at Microsoft and worked on various APIs/services for Windows Azure.

Krishnan the author of "Windows Azure Programming," published by O'Reilly

Krishnan is best known for hosting The Good Time Show with his wife, Aarthi Ramamurthy. The show is now available on YouTube. It's a late-night show that interviews celebrities and tech bigwigs. In the past, the show has featured Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Balmer, and even AR Rahman. Although, on the show's YouTube page, all of the most popular episodes feature Marc Andreessen, Krishnan's boss at a16z.

Sriram Krishnan's Indian Connection

Like ex-Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, Krishnan also has a strong connection to India. Details available in the public domain reveal that Krishnan was born in Chennai and raised in "a typical middle-class Indian upbringing". His education at that time was all in India, as was his university education. Krishnan earned his Bachelor of Technology (B Tech) from SRM Engineering College, Anna University. He and his wife live in the Noe Valley neighbourhood of San Francisco and have a 2-year-old daughter. Krishnan joined Microsoft in 2005 and worked there until 2011. Aarthi also worked with Microsoft around the same time.

As far as Elon Musk is concerned, according to an NYT report, Sriram Krishnan met Elon Musk when he visited the SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California. Later, Musk was a guest on Sriram's The Good Time Show.