Deborah Liu
The Catalyst
Ideas with a spark, energy, range and the ability to start things.
Deborah Liu is The Catalyst because she converts institutional inertia into momentum. At Facebook she took Marketplace from concept to a product used by hundreds of millions, then carried that change-making energy into the chief executive role at Ancestry, reigniting a heritage brand around new data capabilities and storytelling.
“Well, so much of our lives is shaped by decisions made by our ancestors, right? The choice of my parents. I talk to my parents about when they came to America.”
“Yeah, so if you come, it's really the automation and technology that we've built. You know, we have over 130 million family trees that have already been built. And using that, we can help derive a little bit about your cousins, your second cousins, your third cousins, something about your grandparents, your great-grandparents as well.”
“Well, it's been amazing about ancestry. It's just been such a resilient company over so many generations, and yet there's so much more to do. And what I say is, you know, one of the things I really wanted us to do was really make ancestry for all.”
“To his over 3.6 million active subscribers, and these subscribers come to learn more about their history, they're building their family tree, they're discovering new content, they're actually building their family story every single day on our platform.”
The David Rubenstein Show: “Deborah Liu”
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