Washington: With Microsoft posting strong results, the company's CEO Satya Nadella has got a 66 per cent raise in 2018-19 fiscal, taking his total yearly earnings to a whopping USD 42.9 million, according to media reports on Thursday.
While Nadella, 52, has a base salary of a little over USD 2.3 million, most of his pay came from stock awards, reported CNN Business.
He received USD 29.6 million in stock award, USD 10,7 million in non-equity incentive plan compensation and around USD 111,000 in other compensation.
In a proxy statement, Microsoft's independent directors said, "The past fiscal year offered another record year for financial performance, and Microsoft delivered strong results for our shareholders, including a return of USD 30.9 billion in the form of share repurchases and dividends."
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The directors credited Nadella for his "strategic leadership, including his efforts to strengthen trust with customers, drive for a company-wide culture change, and successful entry and expansion into new technologies and markets."
In 2017-18 fiscal, the Hyderabad-born business executive had got a pay of USD 25.8 million.
Nadella became the CEO of Microsoft in 2014. Under his leadership, the company has become a major force in cloud computing.
In September, Microsoft hit an all-time high after the company raised its dividend and authorised a plan to buy back as much as USD 40 billion of its own stock, the CNN Business report said.
In comparison to Nadella, Apple CEO Tim Cook got a pay of USD 15.7 million in 2018 with USD 3 million in salary. Google CEO Sundar Pichai received USD 1.9 million in overall compensation.
Bloomberg previously reported that Pichai turned down a stock award.
