Wikipedia

Sarah Friar

Sarah Friar
OBE
Friar in 2018
Born
Sarah Jane Friar

(1972-12-24) 24 December 1972 (age 52)
Sion Mills, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
NationalityAmerican, British, Irish
Education
OccupationBusiness executive
Known for
Children2

Sarah Jane Friar OBE (born 24 December 1972[1]) is an Irish-American business executive who is the chief financial officer of OpenAI since June 2024.[2] She was the chief executive officer of American technology company Nextdoor from 2018 through 2024,[3] and was chief financial officer of Block, Inc. (formerly Square, Inc.) between 2012 and 2018.[4][5][6]

Early life

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Born in 1972, Friar grew up in the town of Sion Mills in Northern Ireland.[7][1] She attended Strabane Grammar School.[8] Friar won a scholarship from the accounting firm Arthur Andersen after entering a competition; she then worked there for a year before pursuing engineering studies at University of Oxford.[9] She studied metallurgy, economics, and management at Oxford, and then completed an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business where she was an Arjay Miller scholar.[1][10] Friar interned at Ashanti Goldfields in 1990s, during which she was assigned to work at a gold mine in Ghana.[11]

Career

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Friar was an analyst for McKinsey in South Africa,[12] a managing director in equity research at Goldman Sachs, and a senior vice president of finance and strategy at Salesforce[13] before becoming chief financial officer (CFO) at Square in 2012,[14][15][16] and then joining Nextdoor, a hyperlocal social networking service for neighborhoods, as the CEO in 2018. She led the company public through a special-purpose acquisition company in 2021.[17] Nextdoor announced Friar would step down as CEO in mid-2024.[18] In June 2024, she joined OpenAI, the artificial intelligence research organization that develops ChatGPT, as its first CFO.[2]

She is on the board of Walmart and ConsenSys,[19][20] and previously on Slack Technologies and New Relic's boards.[21] She also co-chairs Stanford's Digital Economy Lab and runs Ladies Who Launch, a non-profit focused on female entrepreneurs that she co-founded.[22][23][5]

She received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Ulster University in 2018.[24] In 2019, she was granted an Order of the British Empire from Queen Elizabeth II for her commitment to entrepreneurship and financial services.[25][26]

Personal life

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Friar is married to David Riley, a former hedge fund partner.[13] The couple has a daughter and son.[27] She lives in Marin County, California.[1]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d Nimmo, Jamie (23 January 2022). "Nextdoor chief Sarah Friar: I grew up with bombs, so I don't want to spread hate". The Sunday Times. Archived from the original on 23 January 2022.
  2. ^ a b "OpenAI hires former Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar as first CFO". Reuters. 10 June 2024. Archived from the original on 11 June 2024. Retrieved 11 June 2024.
  3. ^ "Nextdoor Announces Leadership Transition and Reports Preliminary Q4 2023 Financial Results". Yahoo Finance. 23 February 2024. Archived from the original on 17 April 2024. Retrieved 17 April 2024.
  4. ^ Gelles, David (13 August 2020). "A Lifetime of Seeing the Good and the Bad Between Neighbors". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 6 July 2021.
  5. ^ a b Rudegeair, Peter (27 February 2021). "Where Nextdoor's CEO Looks for Neighborly Advice". The Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 6 July 2021.
  6. ^ "Nextdoor's CEO wants to do for community what Jane Fonda did for fitness". Fortune. Archived from the original on 24 July 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
  7. ^ "Tyrone's Sarah Friar leads US Nextdoor into €3.6bn Spac deal". Irish Independent. 6 July 2021. Archived from the original on 24 July 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
  8. ^ Campbell, John (5 June 2017). "Sarah Friar: From Sion Mills to Silicon Valley". BBC News. Archived from the original on 10 November 2023. Retrieved 10 November 2023.
  9. ^ Weckler, Adrian (9 November 2016). "Hip to be Square: meet the most important Irish tech boss you've never heard of". Irish Independent.
  10. ^ "Sarah Friar". Stanford Graduate School of Business. Archived from the original on 9 July 2021. Retrieved 6 July 2021.
  11. ^ Fortson, Danny (8 July 2018). "I took a one-way ticket to the Valley, says Square's Sarah Friar". The Sunday Times.
  12. ^ "Sarah Friar, the neighbour-in-chief steering Nextdoor to public markets". Financial Times. 9 July 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
  13. ^ a b Cook, James (13 May 2019). "From Sion Mills to Silicon Valley: How Sarah Friar became one of the most prominent women in technology". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 10 November 2023. Retrieved 10 November 2023.
  14. ^ Wang, Selina (10 October 2018). "Square CFO Sarah Friar steps down to join Nextdoor as CEO". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on 24 February 2024. Retrieved 24 February 2024.
  15. ^ "Sarah Friar". Corporate - US. Retrieved 6 July 2021.
  16. ^ "Sarah Friar". Forbes. Archived from the original on 6 July 2021. Retrieved 6 July 2021.
  17. ^ Lublin, Joann S. (4 September 2022). "Nextdoor's CEO Sarah Friar Is Opening Doors for Smaller Businesses". Time. Archived from the original on 24 February 2024. Retrieved 24 February 2024.
  18. ^ Savitz, Eric J. (23 February 2024). "Nextdoor Jumps as CEO Exits and Founder Takes Over. It's Buying Back More Stock". Barron's. Archived from the original on 24 February 2024.
  19. ^ "Sarah Friar". Corporate - US. Archived from the original on 6 July 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
  20. ^ Hinchliffe, Emma; Mcglauflin, Paige (8 April 2022). "The Broadsheet: a daily newsletter for and about the world's most powerful women". Fortune. Archived from the original on 8 April 2022.
  21. ^ Swisher, Kara (15 March 2017). "Slack is adding Square CFO Sarah Friar as its first independent board member". Vox.
  22. ^ Savitz, Eric J. (10 June 2024). "OpenAI Names a CFO. It's Likely To Spur Speculation About a Potential IPO". Barron's. Archived from the original on 9 October 2024. Retrieved 18 January 2025.
  23. ^ Murphy, Hannah; Waters, Richard (17 April 2020). "Sarah Friar, Nextdoor's 'chief neighbour' extends her watch". Financial Times.
  24. ^ "Ulster University graduations results: Honour for Silicon Valley boss Sarah Friar". Belfast Telegraph. 9 July 2018.
  25. ^ Hughes, David (23 June 2019). "Queen's birthday honours list 2019: full list of everyone being recognised this year". i. Archived from the original on 10 November 2023. Retrieved 10 November 2023.
  26. ^ "Sion Mills native awarded an OBE in Queen's Birthday Honours". Strabane Weekly News. 21 June 2019.
  27. ^ Canning, Margaret (28 February 2020). "Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar: My business has taken off in Northern Ireland as people here are so neighbourly". Belfast Telegraph. Archived from the original on 10 November 2023. Retrieved 10 November 2023.