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Venture capitalist Peter Thiel has decided to step down from the Meta (formerly Facebook) board of members after spending nearly two decades at the company. The announcement was made in an official statement by Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg:
"Peter has been a valuable member of our board and I'm deeply grateful for everything he has done for our company... He has served on our board for almost two decades, and we've always known that at some point he would devote his time to other interests. I'm grateful he's served on our board for as long as he has, and I wish him the best in his journey ahead."
Thiel also confirmed his own departure and praised Zuckerberg in his official statement:
"It has been a privilege to work with one of the great entrepreneurs of our time. Mark Zuckerberg's intelligence, energy, and conscientiousness are tremendous. His talents will serve Meta well as he leads the company into a new era."
Although the investor did not disclose his future plans, The New York Times reported that Thiel left the company to concentrate on the upcoming midterm election in the U.S.
The publication noted that he will now work towards establishing a political career. Thiel has been a vocal supporter of Republicans and previously backed Donald Trump’s campaign during the 2016 presidential election.
Meta has also announced that Peter Thiel will remain a part of its board until the company’s Annual Meeting of Stockholders later this year, but he will not stand for re-election to the Board of Directors.
Peter Thiel has a net worth of around $2.6 billion
Peter Thiel is a German-American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, tech investor and political activist. He is the co-founder of PayPal and one of Facebook's earliest investors. According to Forbes, he has an approximate net worth of $2.6 billion.
As of January 2022, Thiel held the 279th place on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a daily ranking of the world's top 500 richest people. The majority of his wealth comes from his grand investments and mega entrepreneurial ventures.
In addition to PayPal, the billionaire co-founded Palantir Technologies and Founders Fund. He is also considered to be the longest-serving and first outside investor in Facebook.
Thiel studied philosophy at Stanford University and founded the conservative campus newspaper Stanford Review in 1987. He graduated in 1989 and also earned a J.D. from Stanford Law School in 1992. The investor’s initial fortune came from his corporate career.
Following his graduation, Thiel started working as a judicial law clerk for Judge James Larry Edmondson at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He then served as a securities lawyer for Sullivan & Cromwell and worked as a speechwriter for former-U.S. Secretary of Education William Bennett.
He also served as a derivatives trader at Credit Suisse before founding Thiel Capital Management in 1996. His biggest achievement arrived after he founded PayPal with Max Levchin and Luke Nosek in 1998.
Thiel served as the CEO of the company until it was sold to eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. That same year, he founded the global macro hedge fund Clarium Capital. He went on to launch the big data analysis company Palantir Technologies in 2004 and remained its chairman until 2019.
The venture capitalist also founded venture capital firm Founders Fund in 2005. Peter Thiel invested in Facebook shortly after Zuckerberg founded the social networking site in 2004. He acquired a 10.2% stake in the company for an investment of $500,000.
According to CNBC, Facebook touched $1 trillion in market cap and generated more than $117 billion in revenue in 2021. Although Thiel sold the majority of his Facebook shares for more than $1 billion in 2012, he remained on the board of directors until his recent departure.
Peter Thiel also co-founded venture capital fund Valar Ventures in 2010 and global investment firm Mithril Capital in 2012. The investor even looks after grant-making bodies like Breakout Labs and Thiel Fellowship through the Thiel Foundation.
He funds nonprofit research into artificial intelligence, life extension, and seasteading. As per The Guardian, Peter Thiel recently donated $10 million each to the Senate campaigns of Blake Masters and JD Vance, respectively.
The billionaire recently announced his exit from Meta’s board of members. His departure comes just a few days after the company reported a loss of over $230 billion in quarterly financial results and the largest single-day decline for the social media giant.
