Neville Roy Singham Age, Wife, Family, Biography & More

 

Some Lesser Known Facts About Neville Roy Singham

• Neville Roy Singham is an American businessperson and social activist. He is the founder and former chairman of “Thoughtworks,” an IT consulting company, which he sold for $785 million to a private equity firm in 2017. In November 2023, he came into the limelight after he was accused of sharing Chinese messages in India and other countries. The Enforcement Directorate called him for questioning about a money laundering case related to NewsClick. ^[4]NDTV

• Singham’s father, Archibald Singham, was from Sri Lanka, and his mother was Cuban. His father was a Sri Lankan political scientist and historian who was a professor of political science at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. ^[5]News Click
  

  An old picture of Archibald Singham with Sam Nujoma, leader of Swapo

• When he was young, Singham joined the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, which believed in Black pride and ideas from Mao, a Chinese leader. In 1972, he worked at a Chrysler factory in Detroit while being part of this group. Later, he went to Howard University and then started a business in Chicago and began helping companies in leasing software equipment.

• In the late 1980s, Singham started a company titled “Thoughtworks” in Chicago. The company was incorporated in 1993. It advises on computers and makes custom software. In 2001, Singham started working as a strategic technical consultant for Huawei and worked there until 2008. By 2008, “Thoughtworks” had 1,000 employees. It provides services to big companies like Microsoft, Oracle, and banks. Singham owned most of the company’s stock. In 2010, it began working with Daimler AG, Siemens, and Barclays and opened a second headquarters in Bangalore, India.
  

  Neville Roy Singham while meeting Sitaraman in Bangalore

• In 2010, he sold “Thoughtworks” to a private equity firm for $785 million. At that time, the company had 4,500 employees in 15 countries. Reportedly, Singham was not running the company for some years. Once, the company’s chief scientist, Martin Fowler, wrote to a leading newspaper that Singham was more involved in his activist work and was spending little time at ThoughtWorks. Fowler penned,
  

  While I was surprised to hear that he was selling the company, the news was not unexpected. Over the last few years Roy has been increasingly involved in his activist work, and spending little time running ThoughtWorks. … He’s been able to do this because he’s built a management team that’s capable of running the company largely without him. But as I saw him spend more energy on his activist work, it was apparent it would be appealing to him to accelerate that activism with the money that selling ThoughtWorks would bring.”

  

  The logo of the company ‘Thoughtworks’

• At Thoughtworks, Singham was a leader in making software quickly and efficiently. He also promoted a way of working called Lean manufacturing, similar to how Toyota does business.

• According to Singham, he does not like the idea of keeping software secrets and supports open access and the Creative Commons movement. He believes that everyone should have access to the best software ideas for free. In 2008, he said in a media conference that he aimed to solve the world’s problems by developing technically superior infrastructure. He said,
  

  As a socialist, I believe the world should have access to the best ideas in software for free. My goal is a technically superior infrastructure to solve the world’s problems.”

  

  Neville Roy Singham during a business conference

• Once, he shared in a media conversation that he was a fan of Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and believed that China was a good example of how to run a country. Reportedly, he believed China was a place with both free-market adjustments and long-term planning.

• Singham is known to admire Maoism, and people describe him as “A Marxist with a massive software company!”

• He supports WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange. Singham defended Assange at an event in 2011, along with his fellow activist ‘Peter Thiel’ and former American political activist and economist ‘Daniel Ellsberg.’ Singham has also spoken up for hackers like Jeremy Hammond and Aaron Swartz. Swartz, who used to work for Singham, tragically ended his life while facing legal issues in 2013.

• In 2013, Singham talked about the importance of doing things efficiently. “Thoughtworks” invested in projects in India, Brazil, and China to promote this idea.

• In 2017, Amy Goodman, who hosts ‘Democracy Now!’; Ben Cohen, one of the founders of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream; and V, the playwright who used to be known as Eve Ensler and wrote ‘The Vagina Monologues’, all attended the wedding ceremony of Neville Roy Singham and Jodie Evans. ^[6]Firstpost
  

  Jodie Evans and Roy Singham attend the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival “Shadow World” premiere at Regal Battery Park 11 on 16 April 2016 in New York City

• In 2021, he was accused by “The New York Times” of promoting pro-Chinese government messages by funding causes and groups in America.

• In 2021, India’s Enforcement Directorate accused Singham of being involved in a money laundering case. They said he provided Rs. 380 million (about $5 million) to the Indian news site “People’s Dispatch” between 2018 and 2021. The accusation was that this money was used to support a pro-Chinese viewpoint in the Indian media. They claimed the funds went through various companies and NGOs, including some in the United States like Worldwide Media Holdings (said to be owned by Singham), the Justice and Education Fund, GSPAN LLC, and the Tricontinental Institute. Meanwhile, similar concerns were raised about Centro Popular de Mídias in Brazil.
  

  Neville Roy Singham with a Chinese Communist Party

• A report in January 2022 by New Lines Magazine said that Singham had donated nearly $65 million to some non-profit organizations, including Code Pink.

• In the same year, it was reported that Singham was trying to start a movement in the U.S. to promote peace in Ukraine and oppose NATO enlargement.

• In 2023, he started investing in Chinese companies in food and consultancy. In the same year, he began operating from Shanghai, where he began working with the Maku Group. This group aims to train foreigners about China’s achievements and has received almost $1.8 million in funding from Singham.

• In August 2023, The New York Times stated that Singham had close ties with the Chinese government, and donated money to various groups, news organizations, and entities, using non-profit groups and shell companies to spread messages supporting the Chinese government. Some of these non-profits include the United Community Fund, the Justice and Education Fund, and the People’s Support Foundation. They fund groups such as NewsClick in India, Nkrumah School and Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party in South Africa, Brasil de Fato newspaper in Brazil, and activist groups like No Cold War, Code Pink, People’s Forum, and Tricontinental in the United States. In response to the Times report, Singham said he did not work for any political party or government. ^[7]NDTV
  

  A picture of Xi Jinping, Prabir Purkayastha (owner of NewsClick), and Neville Roy Singham

• Following the report, US Senator “Marco Rubio” asked the United States Department of Justice to investigate entities related to Singham for possible violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).

• In July 2023, Singham participated in a workshop organized by the Communist Party, focusing on promoting the Chinese Communist Party internationally.