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Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

cnbc.com

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Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#131

Post by lupusreal »

hnfong wrote: post #128
michaelt wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's celebrity CEOs and there's celebrity CEOs. Without googling, can you tell me the name of the CEO of Target? Sony? Texas Instruments? BMW? FedEx? Mitsubishi? Exxon? Home Depot? Siemens? Procter & Gamble? 3M? Nestle? Broadcom? I certainly can't. But I bet you can tell me who the CEOs of Tesla and Amazon are. Just because whoever-is-in-charge-of-siemens hasn't run a vanity PR campaign to raise their personal pro…

There's big company and there's BIG company. # Market caps: Target 64.99B Sony ~116B (I think) TI 152B BMW ~70B Fedex 62B Mitsubishi ~70B Exxon 396B Home Depot 343B Siemens 141B P&G 349B 3M 60B Nestle ~290B Broadcom 501B ... Amazon 1520B Tesla 750B The sum of the market cap of the first group of companies is ~2.068T USD, while the sum of the second group is ~2.270T. And of course the CEO of Tesla is(?) allegedly the…

> There's big company and there's BIG company.

Which is Twilio?

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#132

Post by lokar »

dragontamer wrote: post #98
gkoberger wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a genuine question... isn't that his job? For a public company, the CEO has to be a public CEO. Everyone takes on a different persona (some sell themselves as business geniuses, others as creative geniuses, and others as someone you wanna grab a beer with). Some really like it, and some do it begrudgingly. But at the end of the day, you can't be the same CEO of a public company as you were when you were priva…

Only if you pretend that the CEOs job is purely for raising money. Nominally, CEOs are supposed to run the company and help brew the culture that makes that company productive. We've grown a bunch of celebrity CEOs because people stopped caring about how companies worked over the last 10 years of low interest rates. But now that it's harder to raise money, it's time to see these guys run the companies they built.

It depends on the company and what it needs.

At google Eric had very little to do with product and engineering. He was still a very effective CEO.

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#133

Post by vineyardmike »

gkoberger wrote: post #79
maerF0x0 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm somewhat on top of the stock, here's my not financial advice take: 1. Growth rate slowed such that valuations had to come down (went from inevitable overtaking of Salesforce in size, to decades of growth required) 2. Environment -- Cashflow negative meaning another raise was required without fiscal controls and in a high interest environment that's really tough. A return to office end of covid anxiety meant the C…

A few other things that could contribute to a slowing growth rate: 1. People build software differently now. There's not as much reliance on text messages (fewer phone apps build built, 2fa via phone is considered dangerous, etc) 2. Gig economy is stabilizing. There was a huge increase in new companies for years, but at this point it feels like we've stalled on new innovations in that space (while a lot of VC-subsidi…

I have no idea the breakdown of their revenue, but my understanding is that now they do a lot more than just the SMS they were famous for. Especially with all the companies they bought.

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#135

Post by knodi »

I think with the US Carriers mandating proper campaign registration process for texting, even small number of testing it has taken a huge toll on their support. I think earning for last year q4 are about to be lower then expected

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#136

Post by EMCymatics »

throwaway_108 wrote: post #69
shakes wrote: post #38

I worked at Twilio for nearly 10 years and it's hard to overstate what a gift it was to work there and see Jeff operate as CEO up-close. He created an environment where (at our best) we could have fun doing work that had a real impact, and we could it with people we enjoyed doing the work with. He pushed us to be creative to authentically empower and inspire developers. Wanna build a video game that teaches developer…

It's also why George Hu left Twilio. Because Jeff wanted to be a celebrity CEO, and it was to the detriment of the company. All of Twilio's growth (as a public company) happened on George's watch. I don't think it's a coincidence that well after George left, on Jeff's watch - they had to do 3 different layoff for a total of ~24% of their entire public company being let go. Note: former senior level Twilio employee, p…

Why would that be why George Hu left Twilio?

A CEO has to be the face of the company and needs a good reputation. It seems like he was a good leader.

From an outsider it looks wrong.

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#137

Post by rubyfan »

gkoberger wrote: post #89
throwaway_108 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also why George Hu left Twilio. Because Jeff wanted to be a celebrity CEO, and it was to the detriment of the company. All of Twilio's growth (as a public company) happened on George's watch. I don't think it's a coincidence that well after George left, on Jeff's watch - they had to do 3 different layoff for a total of ~24% of their entire public company being let go. Note: former senior level Twilio employee, p…

This is a genuine question... isn't that his job? For a public company, the CEO has to be a public CEO. Everyone takes on a different persona (some sell themselves as business geniuses, others as creative geniuses, and others as someone you wanna grab a beer with). Some really like it, and some do it begrudgingly. But at the end of the day, you can't be the same CEO of a public company as you were when you were priva…

> isn’t that his job?

The CEO’s job is to create value. The answer to your question is “it depends”.

If buyers of their services are impressed with his ability to live code and that moves the needle on results, then yes. If the same can be accomplished by having a non-CEO developer evangelist, then probably no.

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#138

Post by nostrademons »

gkoberger wrote: post #126
itsoktocry wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For a public company, the CEO has to be a celebrity CEO. Is it? From the DJIA: can you even name the CEO of 3M? Cisco? Amex? Visa? I don't think celebrity is a pre-req for being a CEO. And as OP suggests, it could even be a detriment.

I can't. But could most people name Jeff, even in tech? I bet people in finance certainly know (and closely watch) the CEOs of these companies. I did reword my comment though, because I don't agree Jeff is a "celebrity" as much as a "public" CEO.

I work in tech and had never heard of Jeff or George. I could name every CEO of Twitter or Google, or the founding CEOs of companies like Stripe, AirBnB, Uber, Coinbase, etc. Companies like Twilio and Unity don't really register.

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#139

Post by collingreen »

karim wrote: post #112
movingmove wrote: post #81

I had the "pleasure" working for Twilio for over 4 years. I cannot tell how much this showed me how you can fake it til you make it in SF. Twilio tried to expand into Europe and failed miserably. Customers (especially German ones) wanted exact locations of data, exact routes of packet transportation, wanted features Twilio promised on Slides but never delivered. I was part of at least 4 customer meetings (the biggest…

One year into it you knew the company was going to fail yet you stayed on for 3 more years? What happened there?

Part of the problem, perhaps?

Re: Jeff Lawson steps down as CEO of Twilio

#140

Post by ejb999 »

movingmove wrote: post #81

I had the "pleasure" working for Twilio for over 4 years. I cannot tell how much this showed me how you can fake it til you make it in SF. Twilio tried to expand into Europe and failed miserably. Customers (especially German ones) wanted exact locations of data, exact routes of packet transportation, wanted features Twilio promised on Slides but never delivered. I was part of at least 4 customer meetings (the biggest…

this is pretty much my take as well - but as a non-employee - I was a big fan and user of twilio when they first came out, even attended the very first few twiliocon conferences in SF, (mostly developer focused) where they would announce and release new features - lots of excitement as new things got announced and rolled out during the annual conferences.

Then after not very long, you would goto the conferences where they would make announcements about what is coming, but no real timelines attached and some things that were announced, never really materialized - or not fast enough etc.

Then they started diversify like crazy into other areas, unrelated, and I think they really lost their focus - stopped using them (99% stopped) a long time ago for those reasons.

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