By Kurt Wagner , Ed Hammond , and Naomi Nix
Jack Dorsey is stepping down as chief executive officer of Twitter Inc., handing over control of the microblogging site he founded and helped build into a global communications platform that, despite being widely used, has struggled to keep up with its social media peers.
Chief Technology Officer Parag Agrawal, who joined Twitter in 2011, was promoted to CEO. Dorsey will stay on the board of the San Francisco-based company until his term expires in 2022, Twitter said in a statement Monday. Agrawal, 37, is also joining the board, and director Bret Taylor was named independent chairman.
“The company is ready to move on from its founders,” Dorsey said in the statement. “My trust in Parag as Twitter’s CEO is deep. His work over the past 10 years has been transformational. I’m deeply grateful for his skill, heart and soul. It’s his time to lead.”
The 45-year-old Dorsey is also the head of payments company Square Inc., and has been focusing more of his attention on cryptocurrencies, particularly Bitcoin, in recent years. After co-founding Twitter in 2006, he stepped down as CEO in 2008, then returned to the job in 2015. He will continue running Square, according to a company spokesperson.