Tekedra Mawakana is an American businesswoman and lawyer who currently serves as co- chief executive officer of Waymo. Previously, she was the company's chief operating officer, and prior employers have included Steptoe & Johnson,

AOL AOL (stylized as Aol., formerly a company known as AOL Inc. and originally known as America Online) is an American web portal and online service provider based in New York City. It is a brand marketed by the current incarnation of Yahoo (2017� ...

, Yahoo!, and eBay. Mawakana has served on the boards of the

Consumer Technology Association The Consumer Technology Association (CTA) is a standard and trade organization representing 1,376 consumer technology companies in the United States. CTA works to influence public policy, holds events such as the Consumer Electronics Show (CES ...

, the

Global Network Initiative The Global Network Initiative (GNI) is a non-governmental organization with the dual goals of preventing Internet censorship by authoritarian governments and protecting the Internet privacy rights of individuals. It is sponsored by a coalition of ...

, the Internet Association,

Boom Supersonic Boom Technology, Inc. (trade name Boom Supersonic) is an American company designing a , 65-88-passenger supersonic airliner. Named the Boom Overture, the airliner is planned to have a range of and to be introduced in 2025. After being incubat ...

, Operator Collective, and Intuit.

Early life and education

Tekedra Mawakana was born in the U.S. state of Mississippi and later resided in Georgia, Texas, and Virginia. Mawakana is a Doctor of Law. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Trinity Washington University in 1993, before earning her

Juris Doctor The Juris Doctor (J.D. or JD), also known as Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D., JD, D.Jur., or DJur), is a graduate-entry professional degree in law and one of several Doctor of Law degrees. The J.D. is the standard degree obtained to practice law ...

from Columbia Law School.

Career

Mawakana began her career at Steptoe & Johnson, an international

law firm A law firm is a business entity formed by one or more lawyers to engage in the practice of law. The primary service rendered by a law firm is to advise clients (individuals or corporations) about their legal rights and responsibilities, and to r ...

based in Washington, D.C., where she focused on intellectual property and telecommunication. She then held a corporate counsel position at the "mid-size Washington-area" telecommunications company Startec Global Communications. Mawakana later held policy roles in legal departments at

and Yahoo! She worked at AOL for approximately twelve years before becoming Yahoo!'s deputy general counsel in 2013, where she led the Washington, D.C. office and efforts to combat

mass surveillance Mass surveillance is the intricate surveillance of an entire or a substantial fraction of a population in order to monitor that group of citizens. The surveillance is often carried out by local and federal governments or governmental organizati ...

. She then served as eBay's head of global government relations for 14 months, starting in 2016. Mawakana joined Waymo as vice president of public policy and government affairs in 2017. In this role, she focused on expanding autonomous driving testing, regulation, and competition with traditional automobile manufacturers. Mawakana was promoted to chief operating officer in 2019, overseeing the company's communications and marketing,

business development Business development entails tasks and processes to develop and implement growth opportunities within and between organizations. It is a subset of the fields of business, commerce and organizational theory. Business development is the creation of ...

and

operations Operation or Operations may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * ''Operation'' (game), a battery-operated board game that challenges dexterity * Operation (music), a term used in musical set theory * ''Operations'' (magazine), Multi-Man ...

corporate social responsibility Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a form of international private business self-regulation which aims to contribute to societal goals of a philanthropic, activist, or charitable nature by engaging in or supporting volunteering or ethicall ...

, and public relations and policy. Mawakana has served as co- chief executive officer (CEO) of Waymo since April 2021. Her role focuses on business, while co-CEO

Dmitri Dolgov Dmitri Dolgov is a Russian-American engineer who is the co- chief executive officer of Waymo. Previously, he worked on self-driving cars at Toyota and at Stanford University for the DARPA Grand Challenge (2007). Dolgov then joined Waymo's pr ...

concentrates on technology. In 2021, Pete Bigelow of '' Automotive News'' said the duo have a "somewhat unusual power-sharing arrangement", and have "developed a close working relationship and have been heavily involved in Waymo's most high-profile milestones". She is the second Black woman to head a self-driving technology company.

Board service and recognition

Mawakana serves on the

's board of industry leaders, on

's advisory council, and Intuit's

board of directors A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organiz ...

. She is also on the

advisory board An advisory board is a body that provides non-binding strategic advice to the management of a corporation, organization, or foundation. The informal nature of an advisory board gives greater flexibility in structure and management compared to th ...

of the

investment company An investment company is a financial institution principally engaged in holding, managing and investing securities. These companies in the United States are regulated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and must be registered under the ...

Operator Collective, as well as the board of

advocacy group Advocacy groups, also known as interest groups, special interest groups, lobbying groups or pressure groups use various forms of advocacy in order to influence public opinion and ultimately policy. They play an important role in the developm ...

Saving Promise, which works to prevent

domestic violence Domestic violence (also known as domestic abuse or family violence) is violence or other abuse that occurs in a domestic setting, such as in a marriage or cohabitation. ''Domestic violence'' is often used as a synonym for ''intimate partner ...

. Mawakana has also served as chairperson of the Internet Association and on the board of the

. In 2015, Mawakana was included in '' Washingtonian'' magazine's list of "100 Top Tech Leaders", in which she was noted for her work at Yahoo! to "protect the privacy of users" against surveillance by the National Security Agency. She was included in ''Automotive News'' 2020 list of "100 leading women" in the North American automotive industry for her work at Waymo.

Personal life

Mawakana lives in California.

References

External links