YouTube’s former chief executive and long-time Google executive Susan Wojcicki died on Saturday at the age of 56 after a two-year battle with lung cancer.
“It is with profound sadness that I share the news of Susan Wojcicki’s passing. My beloved wife of 26 years and mother to our five children left us today after two years of living with non-small cell lung cancer,” Dennis Troper, Wojcicki’s husband, said in a Facebook post.
“Over the last two years, even as she dealt with great personal difficulties, Susan devoted herself to making the world better through her philanthropy, including supporting research for the disease that ultimately took her life,” Google Chief Executive Sundar Pichai said in a blog post.
One of the most prominent women in tech, Wojcicki, an affiliated American Jew, joined Google in 1999 to become one of the first few employees of the web search leader, years before it acquired YouTube. Google bought YouTube in 2006 for $1.65 billion. Before becoming CEO of YouTube in 2014, Wojcicki was senior vice president for ad products at Google. After nine years at the helm, she stepped down from her role at YouTube in 2023 to focus on “family, health, and personal projects.”
She was replaced by her deputy, Neal Mohan, a senior advertising and product executive who joined Google in 2008. Wojcicki at that time planned to take on an advisory role at Alphabet, Google’s parent company.
“Twenty-five years ago I made the decision to join a couple of Stanford graduate students who were building a new search engine. Their names were Larry and Sergey... It would be one of the best decisions of my life,” Wojcicki wrote in a blog post on the day she left YouTube, referring to Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
“Today we at YouTube lost a teammate, mentor, and friend, Susan Wojcicki,” Mohan said in a post on X.
Jewish values and tikkun olam
Wojcicki’s Jewish heritage was deeply rooted in her maternal grandparents, who were Russian Jewish immigrants. This connection influenced her cultural identity, as her mother, Esther Wojcicki, a renowned educator and journalist, instilled in her and her sisters the values and traditions associated with their Jewish roots. The Wojcicki household emphasized education and intellectual pursuit, shaped by their Jewish and Polish heritage.
Throughout her life, Susan, along with her husband Dennis Troper, supported various Jewish causes through their Troper Wojcicki Foundation. They contributed to organizations like the Oshman Family Jewish Community Center and the Gideon Hausner Jewish Day School, reflecting their commitment to their Jewish heritage and the importance they placed on community and education.
Wojcicki’s Jewish identity was also evident in her dedication to issues such as education and gender equality, aligning with the Jewish concept of tikkun olam (repairing the world). Although she was primarily known for her contributions to the tech industry, her Jewish background remained a significant aspect of her personal and philanthropic endeavors. In 2019, she was recognized as one of the most influential Jews in the world by The Jerusalem Post.
On March 5, 2014, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a series of meetings in Silicon Valley to promote investments in Israel’s technology sector. Among the corporate leaders he met was Wojcicki, who was the CEO of YouTube at the time.
The meetings focused on expanding Israel’s technological collaborations with major tech companies, including Apple and WhatsApp. Netanyahu encouraged these leaders to increase their investments in the Israeli economy and discussed potential opportunities, such as Apple’s possible involvement in Israel’s national cyber park in Beersheba.