He’s the billionaire tech entrepreneur who gave up life in California to live and work from a small village in Tamil Nadu. He speaks and tweets about the importance of doing his duty and dharma, his mission to develop rural India, and how he no longer needs more money. It is not surprising then that Sridhar Vembu, co-founder and chief scientist of software products company Zoho, is held up publicly as a role model – someone with “simple living and high thinking,” as one interviewer put it.
This image, however, stands in sharp contrast to the pre-trial findings of a California court, where Sridhar’s divorce petition is being heard. In a strongly-worded order in January 2025, the court ordered Sridhar to post a bond of $1.7 billion, an unprecedented step as the court itself termed it, and appointed a receiver over multiple Zoho entities in the US and his personal assets, to protect his ex-wife Pramila Srinivasan’s rights.
The court has also paused a significant asset-transfer transaction.
“The record in this case demonstrates that Petitioner (Sridhar) has acted without regard for Respondent’s (Pramila’s) interests in community assets and without regard for the law, and that Zoho Corporation, T&V Holdings, Inc., Tony Thomas, ZCPL and related entities will act at Petitioner’s direction to further Petitioner’s interest and prejudice Respondent’s interests,” the order, passed by the Superior Court of California, County of Alameda, and available as public records, states.
Community assets refer to assets either spouse earns or acquires during their marriage. It’s at the heart of the divorce proceedings between Sridhar and Pramila, who were married for close to three decades. According to California’s laws, where the couple lived with their son, community assets have to be divided equally in a divorce, unless there is a written agreement stating otherwise.
While the contentious issues in the divorce proceedings were first reported by Forbes US in 2023 and followed up by Indian and global media outlets, the January 2025 court order directing Sridhar to post the billion dollar bond is previously unreported. These new developments are part of an upcoming extensive profile of the tech billionaire, to be published in The News Minute soon.
Sridhar moved to India in late 2019 and filed for divorce in 2021. The January 2025 order was passed in response to Pramila’s ex-parte application filed in November 2024. She wanted the court to prevent a transaction which she said would transfer a revenue-generating “community asset” in the US to a third-party.
The transaction in question was the transfer of the business of US-based Zoho Corporation, which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Chennai-headquartered Zoho Corporation Pvt Ltd (ZCPL), considered a community asset, to an entity owned by Tony Thomas, Sridhar’s long-time associate. This transaction was being done in three stages.