Former YouTube boss and Silicon Valley pioneer Susan Wojcicki, who was the video-sharing platform’s longest-serving CEO during some of its most formative years, died Friday at the age of 56, according to a statement from her husband, sparking an outpouring of support and condolences from YouTube creators and technology executives.
Wojcicki became YouTube CEO in 2014
Image by Christian Peacock/The Forbes Collection
Key findings
- Wojcicki died on Friday after a two-year battle with non-small cell lung cancer, her husband Dennis Troper wrote in a Facebook post.
- Wojcicki leaves behind Troper and four of her five children, as 19-year-old Marco Troper died in February.
- Wojcicki became CEO of YouTube in 2014, about eight years after she oversaw Google’s $1.6 billion acquisition of the video-sharing platform.
- She retired from YouTube in early 2023, saying in a statement that she was starting “a new chapter focused on my family, my health, and personal projects that are close to my heart.”
Important reactions
Important background
Wojcicki worked at Intel before becoming one of Google’s first employees. As employee No. 16, she rented her Menlo Park, California, garage to Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page in 1998 – the year the tech giant was founded. Wojcicki became Google’s first marketing manager and was a key figure in the company’s integration into advertising.
She also worked on Google’s video hosting service Google Video in 2005 before overseeing the purchase of YouTube, the service’s rival platform at the time. Wojcicki became CEO of YouTube in 2014 and led the company in launching streaming service YouTube TV and in a $14 billion deal with the NFL for exclusive rights to NFL Sunday Ticket, which allows subscribers to watch NFL games outside their market.
