People often change jobs in search of better opportunities and growth. However, there was a notable case involving Google, which once paid an Indian-origin employee $100 million to stop him from moving to C, which was called Twitter at that time. This employee, Neal Mohan, is now the CEO of YouTube. He was offered this substantial amount as stock grants that would be given to him over several years. This information recently came to light in a podcast hosted by Nikhil Kamath, a co-founder of Zerodha. During the podcast, Kamath mentioned, “I remember reading about Google offering you $100 million not to quit. That was about 15 years ago, which was a huge sum.” Mohan did not deny this claim.
Back in 2011, there was a fierce competition between Google sand Twitter for Mohan’s talents. His former boss at DoubleClick, David Rosenblatt, had joined Twitter and wanted to bring Mohan on board as their Chief Product Officer. To keep him at Google, the company reportedly offered Mohan $100 million in stock grants.
At the same time, Twitter also had its eye on Sundar Pichai, who is now the CEO of Google. Pichai was leading projects related to Chrome, and to retain him, Google offered him a $50 million stock grant.
Here are five key things to know about Neal Mohan:
- He graduated from Stanford University and is a well-known figure in the tech industry.
- Mohan started his career in 1994 as a Senior Analyst at Andersen Consulting, now known as Accenture.
- In 1997, he joined a startup called NetGravity, which was later bought by DoubleClick.
- At DoubleClick, he rose to the position of Vice President of Business Operations. When Google acquired DoubleClick for $3.1 billion in 2007, Mohan took on a leadership role at Google.
- In 2015, he was appointed as the Chief Product Officer of YouTube, and in 2023, he became the CEO of the platform.