Marissa Ann Mayer (/ˈmaɪər/; born May 30, 1975) is an American information technology executive, formerly serving as the president and CEO of Yahoo!, a position she had held starting July 2012. In January 2017, it was announced that she will step down from the company's board upon the sale of Yahoo!'s operating business to Verizon Communications. She announced that resignation on June 13, 2017. She is a graduate of Stanford and was a long-time executive, usability leader, and key spokesperson for Google. Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer may have launched her career in tech as one of Google's first employees, but her meteoric rise hasn't come without problems..
Mayer was born in Wausau, Wisconsin, the daughter of Margaret Mayer, art teacher of Finnish descent, and Michael Mayer, an environmental engineer who worked for water companies. Her grandfather, Clem Mayer, had polio when he was 7 and served as mayor of Jackson, Wisconsin, for 32 years. She has a younger brother. She would later describe herself as having been "painfully shy" as a child and teenager. She "never had fewer than one after-school activity per day," participating in ballet, ice-skating, piano, swimming, debate, and Brownies. During middle school and high school, she took piano and ballet lessons, the latter of which taught her "criticism and discipline, poise, and confidence." At an early age, she showed an interest in math and science.