Rs 2.6 crore a year: Karnataka engineer’s journey from village to NVIDIA’s Deep Learning team

Pruthviraj Prakash, who grew up in a small village near Chitradurga, Karnataka, now reportedly earns an annual salary of around Rs 2.6 crore as a Software Development Engineer in Deep Learning at NVIDIA’s headquarters in Santa Clara, California.

Prakash shared the journey behind the milestone in a LinkedIn post, describing how access to technology ‘once felt out of reach’ in his hometown. ‘What started as a quiet dream in a small town has now become reality,’ he wrote.

His path to NVIDIA ran through a Bachelor of Technology in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from PES University, completed between 2016 and 2020, followed by three years as an engineer at Bengaluru-based technology company Enquero, from August 2020 to July 2023. In August 2023, he enrolled in a Master of Science in Computer Science programme at Clarkson University in the United States, graduating in May 2025.

Within months of graduating, Prakash secured a position at NVIDIA, joining the company’s Deep Learning division in August 2025. ‘Joining NVIDIA feels surreal, not just for the opportunity to work on cutting edge deep learning and AI, but to be part of something bigger, alongside some of the brightest minds in tech,’ he wrote.

Prakash closed his post with advice for students and young professionals working toward careers in technology: ‘To those still chasing their dreams, please don’t stop. Keep learning, stay patient, and move forward one step at a time. What feels impossible today might just become your story tomorrow. Yes, I made it to NVIDIA, and so can you.’