WITH a US$104 million pay packet in 2008, mobile phone-maker Motorola's India-born chief Sanjay Jha has emerged as the United States' top-paid CEO while Citigroup's Vikram Pandit tops the league among bailed-out banks.

In a survey published on April 3 by Wall Street Journal, Mr Pandit is ranked fourth overall with a pay of US$38.2m, while PepsiCo's Indian American CEO Indra Nooyi is in 36th place with a pay package of US$13.98m.

Mr Jha, 45, is an Indian-born engineer who was educated at Strathclyde and Liverpool universities in Britain. He was recruited by Motorola from the Californian telecoms company Qualcomm.

Motorola defended Mr Jha's remuneration, emphasising that it largely consists of share awards. For 2009, he has agreed to a 25 per cent cut in salary and to forgo any cash bonus. 'We have tied the vast majority of his compensation to equity awards linked to the stock price,' a company spokesman said.

He's likely to collect an extraordinary payday only if he can spin off Motorola's sinking handset division and make it work.