Instacart celebrates their IPO at the Nasdaq on Sept. 19th, 2023.
Courtesy: Nasdaq
Instacart on Wednesday appointed business chief Chris Rogers as its new CEO, less than a month after OpenAI announced CEO Fidji Simo as its new head of applications.
Shares were flat.
Rogers, who joined Instacart in 2019, will start Aug. 15 and join the board of directors. Simo will retain her chair position to “smooth the transition,” the company said.
“Over the last four years, we’ve transformed Instacart into a growing, profitable, leading technology platform that’s helping reshape the grocery industry,” Simo said in a release. “We’re building a generational company at the intersection of technology and food, and Chris is the right leader for our next chapter.”
OpenAI announced this month that it had recruited Simo to lead its applications team, reporting directly to CEO Sam Altman. At the time, Altman said in a post that Simo would “focus on enabling our ‘traditional’ company functions to scale as we enter a next phase of growth.”
She joined the artificial intelligence startup’s board last year.
Simo helped take the grocery delivery company public in 2023, after it ballooned in popularity as consumers sheltered at home during the depths of the pandemic.
At the time, Instacart was the first major venture-backed tech IPO since the end of 2021. She also made CNBC’s 2024 Changemakers list.
“There were a lot of questions about whether Instacart would be just another pandemic fad,” Simo told CNBC at the time. “And we have now proven that we not only kept the Covid gains, but grew on top of the Covid gains and grew sustainably and profitably, which is really important.”
Prior to joining Instacart, Rogers spent 11 years at Apple working in a variety of roles, including managing director for the company’s Canada division. He started his career at the delivery company as vice president of global retail, later transitioning into the chief business officer role.
Rogers began his professional career at Procter & Gamble and graduated in 2001 from Canada’s Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, with a bachelor’s degree in business administration.
“We have a world-class team, deep partnerships, leading technology, and a bold vision for the future, and I’m honored to step in and lead Instacart’s next chapter,” he said.
