Bret Taylor

Bret Taylor
TechCrunch · CC BY 2.0 · source
Name	Bret Taylor
Birth date	1980
Birth place	San Francisco, California, U.S.
Alma mater	Stanford University
Occupation	Technology executive, entrepreneur, software engineer
Known for	co‑founder of FriendFeed, co‑CEO of Salesforce, Chief Product Officer at Google, President of Facebook (now Meta Platforms)

Bret Taylor (born 1980) was an American technology executive and entrepreneur known for founding and leading influential companies and products in Silicon Valley. He co‑founded a pioneering social aggregation service, served in senior product and executive roles at prominent technology companies, and co‑led a major cloud software provider during a notable period of industry consolidation.

Early life and education

Taylor was born in San Francisco, raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, and attended public schools in California. He studied at Stanford University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Symbolic Systems and Computer Science and participated in campus organizations and startup culture associated with Silicon Valley, Y Combinator alumni networks, and campus entrepreneurship programs. While at Stanford he engaged with peers who later joined prominent firms such as Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Palantir Technologies.

Career

Taylor began his professional career as a software engineer at Google, where he worked on core products and collaborated with teams responsible for large‑scale systems and user interfaces. He left Google to co‑found FriendFeed, an early social aggregation service that connected feeds from services including Twitter, Facebook, RSS, and Flickr. After FriendFeed was acquired by Facebook, he joined Facebook as Director of Product and later became Chief Technology Officer and President of Platform and Partnerships, working alongside executives from Instagram, WhatsApp, and Oculus VR. Taylor returned to entrepreneurship to co‑found Quip, a collaborative documents and productivity startup that competed with products from Microsoft Office, Google Docs, Dropbox Paper, and Atlassian Confluence. Salesforce acquired Quip, and Taylor joined Salesforce as Chief Product Officer, later becoming Chief Operating Officer and then co‑CEO alongside leaders with backgrounds at Oracle, SAP, Workday, and IBM.

Major ventures and leadership roles

Taylor co‑founded FriendFeed with engineers who had ties to Google and PayPal, creating features that influenced later products from Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. At Facebook, Taylor oversaw initiatives that integrated third‑party developers and worked with teams responsible for features related to News Feed, Open Graph, and social APIs used by developers associated with Android and iOS. As co‑founder of Quip, he led product strategy emphasizing real‑time collaboration competing with incumbents such as Microsoft Office 365, Google Workspace, and services offered by Box and Slack Technologies. After joining Salesforce, Taylor guided cloud software strategy spanning Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Salesforce Platform, and enterprise integrations with vendors like Workday, Veeva Systems, and SAP Ariba. In 2021 he was named co‑CEO of Salesforce alongside an executive experienced at Oracle and board interactions with institutional investors including Silver Lake, Sequoia Capital, and Andreessen Horowitz.

Taylor also served on the boards and advisory councils of technology organizations and startups connected to Stripe, Zillow, Asana, Pinterest, and venture firms involved in rounds for companies such as Stripe, Instacart, Rivian Automotive, and Airbnb. His leadership intersected with major industry events including mergers and acquisitions involving Salesforce, public listings on the New York Stock Exchange, and regulatory discussions in forums such as the Federal Trade Commission and hearings featuring executives from Amazon and Apple.

Philanthropy and public impact

Taylor participated in philanthropic efforts and nonprofit collaborations with organizations like Code.org, Khan Academy, UNICEF, and initiatives supporting STEM education in partnership with institutions such as Stanford University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He contributed to dialogues on data portability and privacy alongside advocacy groups such as Electronic Frontier Foundation and participated in panels that included representatives from Federal Communications Commission and policy scholars from Harvard University and Yale University. Taylor supported disaster relief through corporate giving coordinated with groups like Red Cross and workforce development programs tied to accelerators including Y Combinator and Techstars.

Personal life and recognition

Taylor lived in the San Francisco Bay Area and was connected to a network of entrepreneurs, engineers, and investors including alumni from Stanford University, Harvard Business School, and firms such as Google Ventures and Sequoia Capital. He received industry recognition including listings in technology rankings and awards that fellow leaders from Microsoft and Apple have also received. Taylor was frequently quoted in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Bloomberg News, and technology outlets like TechCrunch, Wired, and The Verge. He appeared as a speaker at conferences including SXSW, Web Summit, Dreamforce, TechCrunch Disrupt, and university forums at Stanford and MIT.

Category:American technology company founders Category:Stanford University alumni