Any business journey is like a roller coaster, and being the company’s founder does not protect you from being dismissed.
After losing an arbitration case he launched against the company, BharatPe founder Ashneer Grover resigned from his own company and stood down as a board member. BharatPe’s decision to conduct a governance review was challenged by the Shark Tank judge, who initiated an arbitration with the Singapore International Arbitration Centre.
Madhuri Jain, his wife, was fired from the company lately, and she described the ongoing governance assessment as “an eyewash and a means to an end.” Grover voluntarily left the company on January 19, and the Board of Directors then ordered an independent audit of the firm’s internal processes.
So, if you think what happened to BharatPe’s MD and Co-founder Ashneer Grover was bad, consider that many other company founders have been fired from their own companies.
Apple’s Steve Jobs and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey are just two examples of high-profile founders who were once driven out by the board in some way.
1. Founder of Apple – Steve Jobs
Steve Jobs was a compelling figure in the early days of the personal computer. Jobs co-founded Apple Inc. in 1976 with Steve Wozniak and built it into a global telecommunications leader. He oversaw the debut of such breakthrough products as the iPod and the iPhone, and is widely regarded as a visionary and a genius.
Why was Steve Jobs kicked out of Apple?
In 1985, over ten years after starting Apple in his parents’ garage, Steve Jobs was sacked from his own firm. In the late 1990s, Steve returned as Apple’s CEO.
In a 2015 graduating speech at Stanford, Jobs said, “I didn’t realise it at the time, but getting fired from Apple turned out to be the finest thing that could have happened to me. The burden of achievement was replaced by the lightness of being a novice once more, uncertain about everything. It allowed me to embark on one of my most creative times.”
Jobs left Apple to found two highly successful firms, NeXT and Pixar, as well as have a family. In his speech, Steve Jobs continued, “I’m very confident none of this would have occurred if I hadn’t been dismissed from Apple.”
2. Founders of Flipkart – Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal
Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, both IIT Delhi alumni and former Amazon workers, started Flipkart in October 2007. Initially, the company focused on online book sales with nationwide shipping. By 2008, Flipkart had risen to prominence and was receiving hundreds of orders every day.
During the Walmart purchase talks in 2018, Sachin Bansal had a falling out with the Flipkart Board of Directors. He quit the company after selling his whole stake for more than a billion dollars. Following an inquiry by the parent firm Walmart into claims of “severe personal wrongdoing,” Binny Bansal resigned from Flipkart, India’s largest e-commerce company by market share, in 2018.
3. Founder of Yahoo – Jerry Yang
Jerry Yang, a Stanford graduate who co-founded Yahoo! and is now a founding partner of the venture fund AME Cloud Ventures, has been named chair of the Stanford University Board of Trustees.
When did Jerry Yang leave Yahoo?
After refusing a takeover offer from Microsoft in 2008, Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang stepped down as CEO and returned to his previous position of “chief Yahoo.” Only four years later, Yang withdrew from the company entirely when the company’s stockholders attempted to sell the company, a move Yang strongly opposed.
4. Founder of Groupon – Andrew Mason
Andrew Mason is an entrepreneur and businessman from the United States. He is the founder and former CEO of Groupon, a Chicago-based website that provides consumers with discounts and scholarships at local companies.
Andrew Mason, the co-founder and former CEO of Groupon, was sacked four and a half years after the company was founded in 2013. The corporation’s stock dropped under Mason’s leadership, and the company faced major financial difficulties. Mason accepted responsibility for the company’s financial problems and, after being sacked, delivered the following statement to his employees: “I’ve decided to spend more time with my family after four and a half intense and fantastic years as CEO of Groupon. I was fired today, just kidding.”
5. Founder of Uber – Travis Kalanick
Travis Cordell Kalanick is an American entrepreneur who is best known as the co-founder and former CEO of Uber.
Why did Travis leave Uber?
After a series of squabbles shook Uber, Kalanick was forced to step down as CEO in 2017, eight years after he launched the ride-hailing startup. The 43-year-old is now the CEO of City Storage Systems, a company that redevelops distressed properties.
6. Founder of Twitter – Jack Dorsey
Jack Patrick Dorsey is an American philanthropist and technology entrepreneur. He is the co-founder and former CEO of Twitter, as well as the founder and CEO of Block, Inc., a financial payments firm.
Why was Jack Dorsey fired in 2008?
Twitter was founded in 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams, Biz Stone, and Noah Glass. Jack Dorsey was named Twitter’s CEO at the start of the company, but it wasn’t long before complaints about his bad management style, lack of communication with board members, and failure to address the company’s continually malfunctioning servers appeared. Jack Dorsey was sacked in 2008 by co-founder and chairman Evan Williams, who was also the company’s principal investor. In 2015, Dorsey returned to the company.
“I’ve decided to leave Twitter because I feel the company is ready to move on from its founders,” Jack Dorsey stated in a statement posted by Twitter in 2021, when he stepped down as CEO. “I have a lot of faith in Parag as Twitter’s CEO. His work has had a profound impact during the last ten years. I owe him a debt of gratitude for his talent, heart, and soul.
8. Founder of BlackBerry – Mike Lazaridis
BlackBerry Limited (previously known as Research in Motion Limited) was founded by Mike Lazaridis in 1984. In the mid-2000s, he built the company by riding the success of the Blackberry smartphone, which was immensely popular among executives and celebrities.
Since then, the company has struggled, and Lazaridis stepped down as CEO in 2012. In 2013, the co-founder of BlackBerry maker Research in Motion, which he co-founded in 1984, stepped down as vice-chairman and director of the company. His decision to leave the company was unexpected, given how well he had turned it around. Later, Lazaridis established an investment fund.
9. Mozilla Corp – Brendan Eich
Mozilla’s chief executive, who co-founded the business in 2002 and is best known for its Firefox browser, has stepped down. Brendan Eich resigned after receiving outrage for his anti-same-sex marriage views.
