5 Things You Don’t Know About Jack Dorsey

The news of Jack Dorsey resigning as the CEO of the microblogging and social media platform, Twitter, came as a surprise. Dorsey has been the face of the platform since it launched in 2006, playing a significant role in international controversies. 

Dorsey will remain on the board of the social networking platform until 2022 when his tenure ends, which will facilitate the transition.

There are claims that he resigned because heading Twitter and his digital payments firm, Square, became overwhelming. It’s also been linked to critiques or concerns, from some stakeholders that he might not perform adequately as a result.

Let’s look at five facts that you probably didn’t know about Jack Dorsey

He owns 2% of Twitter. 

Dorsey co-founded Twitter with Biz Stone and Evan Williams in 2006. He was inspired by the popularity of LiveJournal and AOL Instant Messenger. Dorsey was dismissed as CEO two years later, but he remained chairman of the firm. In 2015, he returned to the position of CEO. 

Based on Bloomberg 2020 values, Dorsey holds 2% of the company, according to Twitter’s proxy for 2021. In 2016, he donated $100 million in Twitter stock to the staff equity pool. The company’s annual reports for 2020 states that it has over 190 million daily active users. 

Prospectus states, Dorsey and two other Twitter stockholders sold 22.6 million shares to three investment banks for $15.93 million each in August 2011. One-third of this sum is credited to Dorsey.

The value of his cash assets is based on the evaluation of share sales, dividends, market performance, taxes and charitable contributions.

He sold his first tweet as an NFT

Twitter’s creator and CEO, Jack Dorsey, auctioned his first tweet as a non-fungible token. It read “just putting up my twttr” when first uploaded on March 21, 2006. The tweet was purchased with Ethereum cryptocurrency and sold for $2.9 million at the auction.

The proceeds from the sale went to a charity in Africa and is assisting with COVID-19 relief. 

He never finished college

Dorsey spent two years at Missouri University of Science and Technology before moving to New York University in 1997. He stayed there for two years but dropped out one semester before graduation.

Jack Dorsey visited Nigeria with the new Twitter CEO,  Parag Agrawal among other executives

In 2019, Parag Agrawal, the new CEO of Twitter, was one of the four Twitter executives who travelled to Nigeria with Jack Dorsey. Parag was formerly the CTO of the company and was the key to Twitter’s breakthrough in AI and Machine Learning.

He Started Square in 2009

Dorsey co-founded Square, a mobile payment service, in May 2010. After he was deemed unfit by stakeholders in 2008 and forced out of the Twitter CEO role. He is still the payment company’s chairman and CEO. His recent resignation from Twitter means Dorsey will have more time to focus on Square. 

READ ALSO: All you Need to Know About Twitter’s New CEO, Parag Agrawal