Bill Maris leaves GV as Krane takes over

Bill Maris, co-founder and managing partner of GV, the corporate venturing unit formerly known as Google Ventures, is leaving the fund and its parent company, Alphabet, Recode reported yesterday.

David Krane is taking the reins at GV and will oversee its global operations as CEO and managing partner, having originally joined Google as director of global communications and public affairs in 2000.

Krane had been a general partner at GV since 2010 before stepping up to a managing partner position in 2014. Investments he has led for the unit include ride hailing service Uber, smart thermostat maker Nest and crowdfunding platform CircleUp.

Maris co-founded Google Ventures in 2009 with an initial budget of $100m per year which was soon increased. It currently invests about $500m each year and had some $2.4bn under management as of December 2015.

Maris operated as a very hands-on CEO of the unit and personally approved every deal, he told TechCrunch last year. The European office GV opened in London in 2014 reportedly had difficulty closing deals because of his reluctance to okay investments.

One of the biggest influences he has had on Alphabet has been the drive to get the company involved in life sciences and health technology, which made up 31% of its investment in 2015.

“There are a lot of billionaires in Silicon Valley, but in the end, we are all heading to the same place,” Maris told Bloomberg last year. “If given the choice between making a lot of money or finding a way to make people live longer, what do you choose?”

There have been numerous successes under his watch. Nest and wind turbine developer Makani were acquired by Google, while other large exits include marketing software provider HubSpot, drug discovery platform iPierian and e-commerce platform Jet, which was acquired by Wal-Mart for $3.3bn last week.

The reasons for Maris’s departure have not been revealed but a source told TechCrunch the executive has chosen to take some time off and consider other projects. His first child was born earlier this year.

Maris leaves behind one of the most substantial portfolios in corporate venturing, one that includes Uber and other billion-dollar companies such as workplace communication platform Slack, mobile commerce company Wish, big data technology provider Cloudera and genomics technology developer 23andMe.

Despite Maris’s departure coming roughly a month after that of GV general partner Rich Miner, Krane will oversee a team that includes Blake Byers, Krishna Yeshwant, Joe Kraus, Karim Faris, M.G. Siegler and Graham Spencer as general partners.

– Photo courtesy of GV