Diane Greene | |
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| Born | (1955-06-09)June 9, 1955 (age 70) Annapolis, Maryland, U.S. |
| Education | University of Vermont (BS) Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MArch) University of California, Berkeley (MS) |
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| Known for | Co-foundingVMware, leadership atGoogle |
| Spouse | Mendel Rosenblum |
| Children | 2[1] |
Diane B. Greene (born June 9, 1955)[2] is an Americantechnology entrepreneur and executive.[3] Greene started her career as anaval architect before transitioning to the tech industry, where she was a founder and CEO ofVMware from 1998 until 2008. She was a board director ofGoogle and CEO ofGoogle Cloud from 2015 until 2019.[4][5] She was also the co-founder and CEO of two startups, Bebop[6] and VXtreme,[7] which were acquired byGoogle andMicrosoft, for $380 million and $75 million.
Born inAnnapolis, Maryland to an engineer and a teacher,[8] Greene received abachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from theUniversity of Vermont in 1976[9] and a master's degree inNaval Architecture fromMIT in 1978.
In 1987, she attended and graduated with a master's degree in computer science from theUniversity of California, Berkeley,[10] where she met her future husband and co-founder of VMware,Mendel Rosenblum.
At age 19, Greene ran the first Windsurfing World Championship and won the national women's dinghy championship in 1976.[8] Early in her career, Greene worked as a naval architect, where she designed ocean-going vessels and offshore structures. She also ran engineering for Windsurfing International. After getting her second master's degree in computer science, she transitioned to the tech industry and worked as an engineer and manager atSybase,Tandem Computers, andSilicon Graphics.[11] She also co-founded and was CEO of VXtreme, which was acquired by Microsoft and became the basis for Microsoft's movie player.[7]
In 1998, Greene,Mendel Rosenblum, Scott Devine, Edward Wang andEdouard Bugnion foundedVMware.[12] With Greene as CEO, VMware created the market for mainstreamvirtualization and pioneeredx86 virtualization. They first introduced the technology on the desktop as a way to run multipleoperating systems side by side without requiring a reboot. They then introduced virtualization on the server as a way to simplify system management, increase server utilization, and save power. Today, virtualization is the ubiquitous way to run servers.
In 2004, VMware was acquired byEMC Corporation for $635 million, and Greene continued as CEO. VMware functioned as a subsidiary, keeping its name, brand, and products and achieving a $2 billion run rate.[13][14] In 2007, VMware went public to a $19.1 billion valuation, making it the largest tech IPO of 2007.[15] On July 8, 2008, Greene was fired as president and CEO by the VMware board of directors and replaced byPaul Maritz, a retired 14-yearMicrosoft veteran who was running the cloud computing business of VMware parent company EMC.[16][11] Greene was asked to stay on and take a significant role in the company, but she declined.[17]
Greene has spoken about her experience founding and scaling VMware atStanford,[18] atYCombinator's Startup School,[19] on (Linkedin co-founder)Reid Hoffman's "Masters of Scale" podcast series, and more.
On January 12, 2012, Greene was appointed to the Google board of directors.[20] Greene filled the 10th seat onGoogle's board of directors, a seat that had previously been filled in October 2009 byArthur D. Levinson.[21]
In November 2015, Greene was named CEO ofGoogle Cloud following the acquisition of her startup,Bebop.[22] As CEO of Google Cloud, Greene created Google's first enterprise-capable business unit. A few months after she stepped down as CEO of Google Cloud in January 2019, Google reported that the company's cloud unit had reached $8 billion in annualized revenue.[23] Greene was succeeded as CEO of Google Cloud by formerOracle executiveThomas Kurian.[24][5] She retained a seat on the board of Alphabet until June of the same year.[25][26][27]
Greene has served as a board member ofAlphabet,Intuit,Khan Academy,SAP,Stripe,A.P. Moller - Maersk, andWix.com.[28] In 2020, she was elected chair of theMIT board of directors.[29] She has also served as co-chair of the advisory board at theUniversity of California, Berkeley'sCollege of Engineering.
Greene met her husband,Mendel Rosenblum, while at Berkeley.[37] The couple has two children together, a son and a daughter, and live inStanford, California.[38] Greene is also an expert crabber and sailor, having grown up doing both in Maryland.[39]
Authority control databases: Academics |
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