File photograph: As an early backer of Fb, Peter Thiel has come to be often called a detailed adviser and mentor to CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
By Clare Duffy | CNN
Peter Thiel, one in every of Fb’s longest-serving and most controversial board members, plans to step down from the corporate’s board later this yr, the corporate stated Monday.
Thiel, an early investor in Fb, has served on the board of the corporate, now often called Meta, since 2005, one yr after the social community launched. He'll function a board director till Meta’s annual shareholders assembly, at which level he won't stand for re-election.
Thiel, lengthy a polarizing determine in Silicon Valley, co-founded PayPal and data-analytics agency Palantir Applied sciences, and is a associate at enterprise capital agency Founders Fund. Along with Fb, he was an early backer of various different distinguished tech corporations, together with LinkedIn and Yelp.
Thiel is understood for his contrarian views, together with investing cash to develop floating cities and inspiring younger folks to skip faculty. He additionally authored the New York Occasions bestseller, “Zero to One,” during which he argues that monopolies needs to be the aim for entrepreneurs.
As an early backer of Fb, Thiel has come to be often called a detailed adviser and mentor to CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
“Peter has been a beneficial member of our board and I’m deeply grateful for every little thing he has achieved for our firm — from believing in us when few others would, to instructing me so many classes about enterprise, economics, and the world,” Zuckerberg stated in a press release Monday.
Zuckerberg, who described the investor as “an authentic thinker,” recommended that Thiel is leaving his place on the board to “commit his time to different pursuits.”
These different pursuits could embody politics, as america approaches midterm elections later this yr. Thiel, a billionaire, plans to again candidates who assist former President Donald Trump’s agenda, the New York Occasions reported Monday, citing an unnamed particular person with data of Thiel’s pondering. A spokesperson for Thiel didn't instantly reply to a request for remark from CNN.
In 2016, Thiel created an uproar in Silicon Valley over his $1.25 million donation to Trump’s marketing campaign. Zuckerberg on the time defended Thiel — and his place on the corporate’s board — saying on an inner submit, “we are able to’t create a tradition that claims it cares about range after which excludes nearly half the nation as a result of they again a politician.”
Thiel can be identified for funding sure controversial endeavors. He was an early investor in Clearview, a startup that compiles billions of pictures for facial recognition expertise, and he funded a lawsuit by Hulk Hogan in 2016 that resulted in Gawker Media going bankrupt. Thiel, who's homosexual, was outed by Gawker’s tech weblog, Valleywag, in 2007.