Todd Pierce obituary – Death, chief digital officer at Gates Foundation Cause Of Death

Todd Pierce, chief digital officer at the Beal and Melinda Gates Foundation, is leaving after 18 months, the organization confirmed to GeekWire on Friday.

“Todd Pierce and the foundation’s leadership team have jointly decided that Todd will step down as chief digital officer,” the foundation said in a statement. “We thank Todd for his work and leadership over the past 18 months, including building a strong leadership team, investing in the personal development of the broader IT team, and pushing us to take risks and adopt digital tools (social, mobile, analytics) etc.) the cloud) to accelerate the Foundation’s core work. Chief Operating Officer Leigh Morgan will serve as the Foundation’s interim IT Director.”

Pierce joined the Gates Foundation in April 2015 in a then-new role. A press release at the time quoted Morgan as saying.

“Todd brings extensive leadership experience in life sciences, technology and biopharmaceutical organizations, as well as the public sector,” Morgan said. “His strong commitment to talent development, combined with a deep understanding of cross-functional operations, will enable Todd to design and lead an increasingly integrated technology and digital platform strategy in service of the Foundation’s mission.”

At the end of June this year, the foundation announced that it would cut 33 positions in its IT department. “Growth and the changing digital environment prompted us to rethink the organizational structure of our IT department,” a spokesperson said in a GeekWire report.

Prior to the Gates Foundation, Pierce was a senior vice president at Salesforce. His biography on the foundation’s website states that before joining Salesforce, he “spent more than 20 years in the healthcare industry, including 10 years as Chief Information Officer at Genentech, overseeing the company’s transition to cloud and Principal at Genentech, leading Roche’s pharmaceutical IT and enterprise infrastructure.” He has also held several public sector leadership positions, including serving as Chief Information Officer at the US Department of Veterans Affairs and Santa Clara County.