Gideon Lee Yu (born May 14, 1971) is a Korean-American technology, media and sports investor, executive and advisor.
Yu is currently a co-owner of the
San Francisco 49ers
The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's National ...
football team. He was previously the team president.
In 2012, Yu became the first president of color in the history of the
National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...
.
[NFL scores A for racial hiring](_blank)
''ESPN'', October 22, 2013 Prior to his career in professional sports management, Yu was a high-technology executive, most notably as the chief financial officer of both
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
and
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
[YouTube Hires Yahoo! Treasurer](_blank)
TheStreet.com, September 3, 2006 as well as the senior vice president and treasurer of
Yahoo
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds ma ...
.
Career
Yu graduated from the
University School of Nashville
University School of Nashville is an independent, coeducational, day school located in Nashville, Tennessee.
History
Referred to colloquially as USN, the school was founded in 1888 by the Peabody Board of Trustees. The school was first founded a ...
in 1989, where he was student body president and received the Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2011. He then attended
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
, majoring in
Industrial Engineering
Industrial engineering is an engineering profession that is concerned with the optimization of complex process (engineering), processes, systems, or organizations by developing, improving and implementing integrated systems of people, money, kno ...
and Engineering Management and received his
MBA
A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...
from
Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA p ...
. In 1989, he received the First Place Grand Award in Environmental Science at the 40th International Science and Engineering Fair.
In his time with the 49ers, Yu led the team's efforts in financing
Levi's Stadium
Levi's Stadium is an American football stadium located in Santa Clara, California, just outside San Jose in the San Francisco Bay Area. It has served as the home venue for the National Football League (NFL)'s San Francisco 49ers since 2014. T ...
, including securing an $850 million stadium construction loan, the largest ever in professional sports, a $200 million financing package from the NFL and the largest long-term stadium financing in NFL history. Yu also directed the 49ers drive to accelerate the opening date of Levi's Stadium from the 2015 to 2014 season. Perhaps the most notable distinction during Yu's tenure at the
San Francisco 49ers
The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's National ...
, however, is that he is the first president of color of any team in the history of the
National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...
. He currently resides in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
.
Prior to joining the San Francisco 49ers football team, Yu was a
General Partner General partner is a person who joins with at least one other person to form a business. A general partner has responsibility for the actions of the business, can legally bind the business and is personally liable for all the partnership's debts an ...
at
Khosla Ventures
Khosla Ventures is an American venture capital firm founded by Vinod Khosla, focused on early-stage companies in the Internet, computing, mobile, financial services, agriculture, healthcare and clean technology sectors. Some of its most successfu ...
, where he led the firm's investment in
Square
In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90-degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length adj ...
and was the founding outside board member (Yu's board seat was later transferred to
Vinod Khosla
Vinod Khosla (born 28 January 1955) is an Indian-American businessman and venture capitalist. He is a co-founder of Sun Microsystems and the founder of Khosla Ventures. Khosla made his wealth from early venture capital investments in areas such ...
).
Previously, Yu was the
chief financial officer
The chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization that is assigned the primary responsibility for managing the company's finances, including financial planning, management of financial risks, record-keeping, and financ ...
of
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
. Upon Yu's hiring, Facebook's founder, Mark Zuckerberg, speaking with the Wall Street Journal, said: "I consider it kind of a coup that we were able to recruit him here.”
Yu led the $375 million investment round from
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
and Hong-Kong billionaire
Li Ka Shing
Sir Ka-shing Li (; born 13 June 1928) is a Hong Kong billionaire business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. As of June 2019, Li is the 31st richest person in the world, with an estimated net wealth of US$33.4 billion. He is the senior ad ...
at a then record $15 billion valuation. Zuckerberg further noted to the Wall Street Journal about Yu, “He's just excellent.”
Before Facebook, Yu was a partner at
Sequoia Capital
Sequoia Capital is an American venture capital firm. The firm is headquartered in Menlo Park, California, and specializes in seed stage, early stage, and growth stage investments in private companies across technology sectors. , Sequoia's total a ...
, and was also the chief financial officer at
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
where he negotiated its $1.65 billion sale to
Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
amidst a competitive auction for the company.
Prior to YouTube, Yu was the
treasurer
A treasurer is the person responsible for running the treasury of an organization. The significant core functions of a corporate treasurer include cash and liquidity management, risk management, and corporate finance.
Government
The treasury o ...
and senior vice president of Finance for
Yahoo
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds ma ...
where he executed over 30 acquisitions/investments for Yahoo, including
Alibaba
Ali Baba (character), Ali Baba is a character from the folk tale ''Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves''.
Ali Baba or Alibaba may also refer to:
Films
* Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves (1902 film), ''Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves'' (1902 film), a F ...
,
Taobao
Taobao () is a Chinese online shopping platform. It is headquartered in Hangzhou and is owned by Alibaba. According to Alexa rank, it is the eighth most-visited website globally in 2021. Taobao.com was registered on April 21, 2003 by Alibaba Cl ...
,
Overture
Overture (from French ''ouverture'', "opening") in music was originally the instrumental introduction to a ballet, opera, or oratorio in the 17th century. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn composed overt ...
,
Inktomi
Inktomi Corporation was a company that provided software for Internet service providers (ISPs). It was incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in Foster City, California, United States. Customers included Microsoft, HotBot, Amazon.com, eBay, ...
,
Flickr
Flickr ( ; ) is an American image hosting and video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was a popular way for amateur and professional ...
,
del.icio.us
Delicious (stylized del.icio.us) was a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks. The site was founded by Joshua Schachter and Peter Gadjokov in 2003 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. By the end of 2008, t ...
and over $5 billion of capital markets transactions. Prior to Yahoo, Yu was the chief financial officer of NightFire Software (acquired by
NeuStar, NYSE: NSR) and held positions at
Disney
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
,
Hilton
Hilton or Hylton may refer to:
Companies
* Hilton Worldwide Holdings, Inc., a global hospitality company based in the United States that owns several hotel chains and subsidiary companies containing the Hilton name
** Hilton Hotels & Resorts, fla ...
, and
DLJ /
CSFB.
Philanthropy
Yu serves on the board of trustees of the
Monterey Bay Aquarium
Monterey Bay Aquarium is a nonprofit public aquarium in Monterey, California. Known for its regional focus on the marine habitats of Monterey Bay, it was the first to exhibit a living kelp forest when it opened in October 1984. Its biologists ...
and the board of directors of
Tipping Point Community
Tipping Point Community is a grant-making organization aiming to break the cycle of poverty for people in the San Francisco Bay Area whose income level is too low to meet their basic needs. It was founded by Daniel Lurie in 2005.
In addition to ...
. Yu is also active philanthropically at his alma mater,
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
, where he "made a significant commitment to undergraduate scholarships" and "is volunteering as a member of the School of Engineering Advisory Council and the School of Earth Sciences Task Force." He previously served on the boards of directors of the
UCSF
The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is a public land-grant research university in San Francisco, California. It is part of the University of California system and is dedicated entirely to health science and life science. It condu ...
Medical Foundation, and BUILD.
References
External links
2011 "Forbes" Names You Need to KnowThe 2012 Silicon Valley 100Yu Among ''Treasury & Risk Magazine's'' 40 under 40
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yu, Gideon
Google employees
Facebook employees
Yahoo! employees
Private equity and venture capital investors
Venture capitalists
Living people
1971 births
Stanford University alumni
Harvard Business School alumni
American people of Korean descent
American chief financial officers
20th-century American businesspeople
21st-century American businesspeople