Today we learned who is going to be the un-Zuckerberg for Facebook, as the company stole vice president of global online sales and operations from Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), Sheryl Sandberg, to be the new COO of the company.
Sandberg is an excellent choice, as she's helped guide Google into being one of the leading companies in the world. Her six years of helping grow Google will be indespensible experience she hopefully will be able to migrate to Facebook, which is a different type of business altogether from Google.
All of this is positioning the company for an eventual public offering, which is projected to happen in 2009 or 2010.
At this time the wouldn't do much for seasoned investors, who know they haven't found a way to successfully monetize the social networking site yet. Annual revenue for the company only stands at a paltry $100 million - nothing for people to get excited about.
Sandberg was hired to change that of course, and the coming public offering means she's been given time parameters to work with to make the company valuable in investors eyes. Just because they get a lot of media love and coverage, has nothing to do with being a profitable company.
Both Sandberg and Mark Zuckerberg were giving each other a lot of media love today, with Sandberg saying concerning Zuckerberg that "Mark is inspiring. He has more clarity and vision than just about anyone I ever met."
Zuckerberk also said in a statement about Sandberg that she was a "great manager who will help scale Facebook's operations globally."
While Sandberg asserted she wasn't leaving Google because of problems, this is still a blow to them. It reinforces a negative trend with the company, even if things aren't too bad internally.
Sandberg added that it was the challenge of helping to make Facebook into a social networking bellwhether that appealed to her, and she is thrilled to be part of helping to shape that in the time ahead.
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Facebook Lures Ex-Google Exec as COO
Sandberg will assume the COO post on March 24, and will be responsible for "helping Facebook scale its operations, and expand its presence globally," Facebook said in a statement.
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Facebook taps Google exec Sheryl Sandberg as COO
Sandberg joined Google in 2001 and brings a lot of management expertise to Facebook. Before Google she was the Chief of Staff for the United States Treasury Department, where she helped lead its work on forgiving debt in the developing world.
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Google Veteran Leaves for Facebook
Sandberg, Google's 38-year-old Vice President for Global Online Sales and Operations, set up and manages the unit that handles sales for about 99% of Google's advertisers and helped spearhead other initiatives such as its Google.org philanthropic arm.
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New Facebook COO Sandberg's First Move: Hit Slopes
OK, so what are you going to do when you start at Facebook on March 24?
"The first priority is work with the team to help them scale: Operationally, globally, and in terms of a business model."
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