Sebastian Thrun Picks an Executive of LendingTree as a New CEO at Udacity

IBL News | New York

Udacity announced yesterday the appointment of Gabriel Dalporto as a new CEO, after nearly ten months searching for a top executive. Dalporto fills a vacant position since Vishal Makhijani stepped down in October 2018.

“With Gabe’s dynamic leadership style and outcome-driven approach, I know he is the right person to lead Udacity into our next phase of growth,” wrote Sebastian Thrun, co-founder and currently in charge of day-to-day operations at Udacity in a blog post . “And I will continue to support him as Executive Chairman of Udacity,” he added.

Gabriel Daporto’s last managing position was CFO at LendingTree. He was also a member of the Board of Directors at LendingTree and Guitar Center.

“Gabe takes over Udacity at an opportune moment in time,” explained Thrun while issuing an array of bullish statements:

  • “Since June 2019, the company has been cash-flow positive, and it is growing aggressively”.

  • “The consumer business has grown by more than 60%.”

  • “Our enterprise and government businesses are also booming, with bookings each increasing by over 100% year over year.”

  • “Our corporate clients now consistently report over 80% course completion rates, a far cry from MOOCs and other content-only offerings.”

  • “Staying truthful to our social mission, we launched more than 50,000 new scholarships with AT&T, Google, Bertelsmann, Facebook, and AWS.”

[Gabriel Dalporto and Sebastian Thrun, in the picture above]

[Official Press Release: Udacity Names Gabriel Dalporto as Chief Executive Officer]