Uber founder Travis Kalanick leaves board, severing last tie

Kalanick, 43, started Uber in 2009 with Garrett Camp and turned the small startup into a behemoth that defined the ride-hailing industry. Investors forced Kalanick to resign as chief executive in 2017, after a series of privacy scandals and complaints of discrimination and sexual harassment at the company.

“Uber has been a part of my life for the past 10 years. At the close of the decade, and with the company now public, it seems like the right moment for me to focus on my current business and philanthropic pursuits,” Kalanick said in a statement Tuesday. “I’m proud of all that Uber has achieved, and I will continue to cheer for its future from the sidelines.”

Kalanick has steadily sold more than $2 billion of his shares in the company and on Thursday will finalize the sale of his remaining stake, a spokeswoman said. He initiated the sale of his last remaining shares on Friday and announced his resignation in a letter to the board on Monday.

In 2009, Kalanick and Camp started Uber as a black car service that riders could hail from their phone. Kalanick stepped into the role of chief executive in 2010 and oversaw a period of rapid growth at the company.

But 2017 was a year of reckoning for Kalanick and Uber: A former engineer at the company (who is now an editor in the Opinion section of The New York Times) spoke publicly about her experiences of sexual harassment at Uber and said her managers did nothing to curb the behavior. A video of Kalanick berating an Uber driver who questioned him over falling wages also emerged. And revelations about Uber’s efforts to spy on competitors and thwart regulators surfaced.

Kalanick resigned in June 2017. Camp, his co-founder, remains on Uber’s board.

Dara Khosrowshahi, a former executive at the travel company Expedia, was appointed as Kalanick’s replacement and tasked with cleaning up Uber’s culture.