Google bigwigs get executive pay boost

Pay rise

Google is patting its executives on the back and offering them a hefty pay increase, according to a US filing.

It was revealed last week all employees at Google would be getting a 10 per cent pay rise, as well as a $1,000 (622) bonus. However, the higher echelons are set to get a massive 30 per cent hike in wages in 2011.

The extra cash will go to four of Google's top executives and bring their salaries up from $500,000 to $650,000.

The four fortunates are chief financial officer (CFO) Patrick Pichette, president of global sales Nikesh Arora, senior vice president of engineering Alan Eustace and chief technology strategist Jonathan Rosenberg.

They will also receive equity awards of $20 million for Pichette and Arora, $10 million for Eustace and $5 million for Rosenburg.

Chief executive (CEO) of Google Eric Schmidt, along with founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, continue to keep a $1 per year salary and have "declined" to take part in the executive bonus plan, said the filing.

Rumours have been circling Silicon Valley that Google was boosting everybody's wages to ensure they didn't defect to the company's biggest rival, Facebook, and TechCrunch reported one engineer was given stock amounting to $3.5 million to stop him making the move.

Jennifer Scott

Jennifer Scott is a former freelance journalist and currently political reporter for Sky News. She has a varied writing history, having started her career at Dennis Publishing, working in various roles across its business technology titles, including ITPro. Jennifer has specialised in a number of areas over the years and has produced a wealth of content for ITPro, focusing largely on data storage, networking, cloud computing, and telecommunications.

Most recently Jennifer has turned her skills to the political sphere and broadcast journalism, where she has worked for the BBC as a political reporter, before moving to Sky News.