Reflecting on the last nine years, and Fastly’s new CEO
I am stepping into the role of Chief Architect and Executive Chairperson, and Joshua Bixby will become our new CEO. Growth and change have always come hand-in-hand at Fastly. Earlier today, Joshua and I sent the following emails to our employees at Fastly announcing this leadership transition.
Fastly was founded by developers, for developers. I am incredibly proud of what we’ve achieved over the last nine years, both in terms of our technological innovation and our community. Thank you for your continued partnership, enthusiasm, and for building amazing things on Fastly. This is only the latest step in our journey to build a more trustworthy internet. The future is bright, and I can’t wait to build more with you in my new role.
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I sent the following email to Fastlyans:
tl;dr I have decided to step into the full-time role of Chief Architect and Executive Chairperson of Fastly, and Joshua Bixby, our President, is Fastly’s new CEO. I am going to help with product, engineering, and sales, focusing on Compute@Edge and security.
Fastlyans,
I am writing to you today to share some exciting news that will position us for the next stage of Fastly’s growth.
I have decided to step into the full-time role of Chief Architect and Executive Chairperson of Fastly, and Joshua Bixby, our President, is Fastly’s new CEO.
As I look back on the past nine years since Fastly’s founding, I am amazed and incredibly proud of what we have accomplished. We launched Fastly at a time when existing solutions weren’t equipped to enable global, real-time experiences. We saw a gap in the market, and we knew we could fill it. Since then, we have continued to grow, each year providing more value to our community of developers. Last year, becoming a public company was a major milestone for us. But that was just the beginning. This year, we are continuing to build on this tremendous opportunity.
As many of you know, I recently became a father. During my parental leave, I took time to step back and reflect on the past nine years. I had two major realizations:
I am incredibly grateful. I have the privilege of working with exceptional people (all of you) who are dedicated to our vision of creating a trustworthy internet. I am proud that we have chosen to grow with transparency, integrity, and inclusion. I am inspired daily by our developers, all Fastlyans, customers, and partners who build cutting-edge products on our platform. And every day, all of us get to deliver new technologies and experiences that push the edge of innovation. I am more excited about our future than I have ever been.
At my core, I am a developer. While I will always cherish the time I have spent leading Fastly, my true strengths and passions lie in building the architecture and innovation, including our compute platform. I like being in the trenches, solving the most complex problems for our customers, and ultimately providing them with a better experience at the edge.
Fastly has grown as a values-first organization, scaling our teams, services, and customer portfolio purposefully. We have evolved from startup to public company, next-gen CDN to edge cloud platform. For most of this journey, I have been fortunate to partner closely with Joshua in setting, overseeing, and executing Fastly’s long term strategy.
As many of you know, Joshua has run different parts of Fastly during his tenure including marketing, sales, product, corporate development, infrastructure, and security. Several years ago, I entrusted him to run the part of the organization that I have the most expertise in – engineering. I have learned that Joshua is open-minded, a creative problem solver, and an innovator at heart. He intuitively understands what type of people, systems, and organization are needed to grow with integrity and humanity. Most importantly, he cares deeply about our employees, partners, and customers. The Board and I believe that Joshua is the right person to lead Fastly into the future.
As we move forward, Joshua will assume the day-to-day oversight of the business, while I will take on the more technical role of Chief Architect, building secure modern web applications with Compute@Edge. I will continue to closely collaborate with Joshua and our leadership team, helping to support the long-term strategic direction of the company, forwarding our modern network approach for edge compute, helping our customers, and recruiting great talent.
Thank you for giving me the honor of serving as your CEO. And please join me in congratulating Joshua on his new role.
Artur
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Joshua sent the following email to Fastlyans:
Dear Fastly,
It is an incredible honor to lead and serve Fastly. We are on an exciting journey to build a more trustworthy internet, and I am energized to continue our momentum as Fastly’s CEO.
As many of you know, I started working with Fastly over six years ago, and in that time, I have had the pleasure of working closely with many of you. I’m also lucky to have developed a true partnership with Artur. We have built immense trust, augmented each other's strengths, and built a resilient relationship focused on making Fastly the best it can be. I am humbled and truly grateful for this partnership. The announcement today of a title change for both of us is another step on our path. As we move into these new full-time roles, we will continue to collaborate closely, just as we always have, while also focusing on where our strengths and passions lie.
As an entrepreneur, I believe in delivering on a mission that makes it easier for other innovators to deliver. We fuel the next modern digital experience by providing developers with a programmable and reliable edge cloud platform that they adopt as their own. This means we have to evolve our technology ahead of our customers, which is an intriguing challenge. I am eager to continue to build out our serverless computing offering, as it will empower developers to build far more advanced applications at the edge. Fastly is on a great trajectory, and we remain poised to do so much more.
As a person, I believe in being driven by a set of values. Twenty-seven years ago, I met my wife working at a summer camp in the Canadian coastal rainforest. Our relationship has taught me many things, but most importantly, two key values that drive me still to this day. One, I have to be as good at my job as I have to be in my personal relationships. I need to have the same passion, drive, and dedication to both. Two, in order to do this, I also need to be authentic, speak honestly, and to be vulnerable. This means expressing what I think, how I feel, and to create a safe space for those around me to do the same.
Our values and culture are woven into the fabric of Fastly, and I can see my own principles reflected back at me every day that I’m here. I have the pleasure of speaking to almost every new onboarding class at Fastly, and I pass on a few words of unsolicited advice which I try to follow:
Fastly is flourishing! We are also constantly learning and improving. Most tomorrows continue to be better than most yesterdays. We continue to add leaders and team members that make us stronger.
Families matter. Take time to prioritize yourself and your loved ones – to coach multiple soccer teams, to plan trips and visits, to support in whatever way is required – take time off when you need it. My three young boys, my wife, and my extended family/friends are my top priority. I will continue to make this the case. It is possible to live this value, and provide tremendous value to the business. I will continue to walk my kids to school most mornings, be at the dinner table most nights (no phones allowed), be a good friend, and be the best father and partner I can be.
Come to situations with grace, learn what was assumed. When moving into a new situation or new job, it is important to give the current team the benefit of the doubt, and assume that the solutions that were put into place were the best systems they could devise given the constraints at the time. Despite my experience with different parts of the business and collaboration with many of you, I still have a lot more to learn. I am excited by this prospect, and look forward to working with those of you that I have not already.
We are building a trustworthy internet, where good can thrive. At Fastly, we are dedicated to building a more equitable company and world. This necessitates us having an opinion and acting on it. We will continue to advocate publicly on issues that impact our people, and to say no to traffic that we deem hateful and violent.
Use your power to help others. Give back, donate, and spend time thinking about how to help your fellow colleagues, friends, and communities. I will continue to dedicate myself to using my power and privilege to help others.
I want to thank you all for your support and for Artur and the Board’s confidence in me to lead us all forward. I look forward to continuing on this journey with all of you.
Warm regards,
Joshua
