Mark Zuckerberg announces Javier Olivan as the next COO; Know all about the new COO

After Sheryl Sandberg announced her departure from Meta, formerly Facebook, after 14 years, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Javier Olivan as the company's next COO. Olivan has been responsible for the company's growth for the past 15 years, but most of his work took place behind the scenes.

Sandberg said she would officially step down as COO this fall when Olivan will formally take over as COO. Sandberg, also Meta's second-top executive after Zuckerberg, said she would remain on the board, but her main focus will be on philanthropic work.

All about Javier Olivan

The next COO, Olivan, grew up in the Pyrenees region of northern Spain. He is an electrical and industrial engineer from the University of Navarra and has a Master's degree in Business Administration from Stanford University.

He joined Facebook in late 2007, before which he worked at Japan's NTT and Siemens. Fifteen years ago, Olivan joined Meta, then Facebook, as head of international growth. It is said that under his leadership, Facebook was able to successfully expand to global markets such as India, Japan, Russia, Indonesia and Brazil.

Olivan most recently served as chief growth officer, and under the role, he reportedly managed features and functions across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. As COO, he will continue to lead infrastructure and corporate development. As Meta's CEO mentioned in an official Facebook post, Olivan will also be responsible for advertising and commercial products.

Olivan joined the Zuckerberg-led company when Facebook had around 40 million users, and now there are nearly 3.6 billion users across all the Meta family apps.

Although Olivan will take over from Sandberg, his role will be different. "This role will be different from what Sheryl has done. It will be a more traditional COO role where Javi will be focused internally and operationally, building on his strong track record of making our execution more efficient and rigorous," Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post. This means that despite being the COO of Meta, Olivan will stay out of the spotlight, unlike Sandberg.

Sandberg's decision to leave Meta comes when the company is struggling with slowing growth and rising costs. Meta is currently in a crucial stage of transformation from a social media company to one focused on building the metaverse.