Twitter Loses Another Key Executive

Twitter’s Vice President for Corporate Development and Strategy, Rishi Garg, announced his departure on Twitter last Friday (June 26). “After an amazing ride as Twitter’s VP Corporate Development and Strategy, I’m saying farewell today,” he said.

He is the latest to resign in a series of departures. CEO Dick Costolo left less than three weeks ago. A few weeks prior, it was Jessica Verrilli who stepped down as Director of Corporate Development and Strategy in order to move to Google Ventures. She had first joined the company in 2009.

Garg, on the other hand, had stayed at Twitter for a short but busy 13 months. He led the company’s mergers and acquisitions team which, according to Business Insider, has made “defining” acquisitions during his time there. They include Periscope, a live video product that was a $100+ million deal, and Niche, a social ad company, worth $50 million.

“Our team has built a stronger Twitter with a dozen acquisitions in the last year. Hats off to @dickc [Dick Costolo] for admirable leadership, humor, energy and trust,” Garg tweeted.

Garg joined Twitter from Square in May 2014 where he was head of corporate development for the payments company. Garg addressed a tweet to Jack Dorsey, current interim Twitter CEO, who is also co-founder and CEO at Square, saying: “I can’t wait to witness the company’s next chapter under @jack, a truly gifted leader and human being.”

So far, Twitter has not made public who will be replacing him nor has Garg expressed exactly what he will be doing from now on. “I’m off to pursue some exciting new projects; more soon! #staytuned,” he tweeted.

Meanwhile, rumors about Google buying out Twitter are still ringing. A few weeks ago, a fresh round of chatter about Twitter’s buyout by Google sent the company’s stock up by 3 percent as reports valued the microblogging site at $100 billion only a couple weeks after Costolo’s resignation.

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