Three Indian Americans among 26 of the Top Women Engineers

WASHINGTON (TIP): Three Indian Americans were among the top women engineers recognized in a Business Insider piece.

The Business Insider Feb. 24 piece on the “Most Powerful Women Engineers” of 2016 was released in the midst of National Engineer’s Week, Feb. 21 through Feb. 27. The list was generated to give a “shout-out to the female engineers with powerful careers who are leading important technologies at their companies or being pioneers in other ways.”

Oracle’s Vinita Paunikar, Affirm’s Trisha Kothari and Intel’s Sumita Basu were recognized in the Business Insider list.

Oracle's Vinita Paunikar
Oracle’s Vinita Paunikar

Paunikar was the highest ranked of the Indian Americans, coming in at No. 14.

Vinita Paunikar is a vice president at Oracle responsible for release management of products and services.

She created a release-management team that has launched 200 products across more than 20 lines.

She’s also worked on several of Oracle’s mainstay products, including its flagship systems-management solution, Enterprise Manager Cloud Control, now also the core-management platform for Oracle’s cloud services.

A graduate of Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology in Maharashtra.

Affirm's Trisha Kothari
Affirm’s Trisha Kothari

Trisha Kothari is making a name for herself at the young age of 23.

Kothari is Affirm’s first female engineer at the financial-technology startup cofounded and led by Max Levchin, the former cofounder of PayPal.

Affirm turns your smartphone into a credit card of sorts, allowing you to make monthly payments on things you buy from merchants that accept it.

“Trisha was instrumental in building the core aspects of a financial platform that powers everything we do,” Affirm’s COO, Huey Lin, said about her.

Levchin even goes so far as to say that “Trisha Kothari is one of the most exciting up-and-coming coders in America.”

Before joining Affirm, Kothari did several internships at Google and LinkedIn. She also earned a Google Anita Borg scholarship and one from Microsoft and is a member of the high-IQ organization Mensa.

She is a graduate of Dhirubhai Ambani International School and the University of Pennsylvania.

Intel's Sumita Basu
Intel’s Sumita Basu

At No. 26: Intel’s Sumita Basu is a strategist and technical assistant to the Intel vice president and general manager.

She’s been with Intel since 2002 with increasing responsibilities. In her last gig with the company, she oversaw the equipment installation for Intel factories worldwide — a huge job.

For her PhD, she did experiments with the International Space Station.

One of Basu’s most impressive accomplishments is that she invented the world’s first lead-free patterning process, allowing Intel to become the first chip company in the world to limit the use of that toxic substance in its manufacturing processes.

A graduate of Jadavpur University (bachelor’s) and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (doctorate), Basu has also invented the world’s first lead-free patterning process. The invention has allowed Intel to become the first chip company in the world to limit the use of that toxic substance in its manufacturing process, according to the Insider piece.

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