Bret Taylor steps down as co-CEO of Salesforce

In a shock statement released yesterday, Salesforce said Bret Taylor will resign as co-CEO on Jan. 31, leaving his long-term colleague Marc Benioff . This comes as it has been exactly one year since Salesforce promoted Taylor, 42, from the position of president and chief operating officer. Benioff described Taylor as “a phenomenal industry leader who has been instrumental in creating incredible success for our customers and driving innovation throughout our company.”

Encase you have been living under a rock, who is Brett Taylor?

Bret Taylor was born on July 10, 1980, and is an American computer programmer and entrepreneur. It is particularly noteworthy that he co-created 谷歌 Maps and served as a CTO at Meta , as chairman of Twitter Inc.'s board, and as co-CEO at Salesforce (with Marc Benioff).

As a founder of FriendFeed and the creator of #Quip, Taylor sold his start-up Quip to #Benioff in 2016. As well as this, Taylor played a key role in Salesforce's acquisition of #Slack for $27.1 billion, the largest deal in Salesforce's history.

An overview of Brett Taylor's education and professional background

In 2002 and 2003, Taylor earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in computer science from 美国斯坦福大学 .

In 2017, Taylor was appointed to the position of chief product officer at Salesforce, and then in 2019, he was appointed to the position of president and chief operating officer. During his tenure as COO, Taylor contributed to Salesforce's acquisition of Slack, which closed in 2021. Taylor also led the development of a system known as #Customer360 for Salesforce and introduced a program for associate product managers. As of November 2021, Taylor had been named co-CEO of Salesforce as well as vice chair. The present-day is marked by the announcement yesterday, November 30, 2022, that Taylor will be stepping down as co-CEO and vice chair at Salesforce at the end of January 2023.

Why is he stepping down??

In a statement on Wednesday, Salesforce announced that Bret Taylor will leave his role as co-CEO on Jan. 31, leaving Marc Benioff to fulfill the role as sole CEO. Having served as co-CEO for about a year, and having been promoted from president and chief operating officer the statement has come as somewhat of a shock.

So here's the scoop on why he's stepping down.

Brett Taylor stated the following in a statement:

“I am grateful for six fantastic years at Salesforce,”

“Marc was my mentor well before I joined Salesforce and the opportunity to partner with him to lead the most important software company in the world is career-defining.”

“After a lot of reflection, I‘ve decided to return to my entrepreneurial roots. Salesforce has never been more relevant to customers, and with its best-in-class management team and the company executing on all cylinders, now is the right time for me to step away.”

Benioff also commented on the news stating Taylor’s departure was “bittersweet.”

“It’s bittersweet that Bret has decided to step down as my co-CEO,”

“He made his mark on Salesforce as an incredible technologist, leader, and friend to us all. Bret founded two incredible companies so it’s understandable why he wants to return to his entrepreneurial roots. I’m excited to see his next chapter unfold, as I’ll always be his biggest champion and he’ll always be part of the Salesforce ‘Ohana.’”

Information on statement sourced from Salesforce - Bret Taylor to Step Down as Salesforce Vice Chair and Co-CEO; Marc Benioff to be Chair and CEO