According to a new report from Recode, the founder and CEO of Google Ventures – recently rebranded as GV – is leaving the firm and the firm’s parent company, Alphabet. The report, citing “sources,” says that Bill Maris will depart this coming Friday, August 12th.
Maris will be replaced by David Krane, who is currently a managing partner for Google Ventures and has been with Google for over 16 years, originally working in communications.
Under Maris, Google Ventures has had its fair share of hits, getting in early on startups including Uber, Nest, Slack, and the recently-acquired Jet.com. The hits haven’t come without misses, however. As Recode notes, one of GV’s biggest misses came with the app Secret. Google Ventures is the “most active corporate venture arm,” according to CB Insights.
Maris originally founded Google Ventures in 2009. Recently, the firm’s investments have drifted into the health and biotech industries, both of which are said to be very interesting to Maris.
Maris is considered to be very close to Google co-founder and CEO Larry Page, as well as co-founder Sergey Brin, making his departure somewhat surprising. Though, Google did lunch another investment wing in Google Capital in 2013, which actually competed directly with GV and Maris in some cases. That strife – as well as perhaps a rocky transition through the Alphabet reorganization – could be at least part of the reason for Maris’s decision to leave.
Google Ventures has not yet commented on the reported departure of Maris.
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