Margo Georgiadis was named Ancestry President and CEO and appointed to the Board of Directors in May 2018. Prior to joining Ancestry, Margo served as CEO of Mattel, the global leader in play, learning and development. Previously she was the President of Americas at Google, overseeing commercial operations and advertising sales, and before that was Google’s Vice President of Global Sales Operations, leading the teams that enabled the successful commercialization of Google’s products and the development of new businesses in local and commerce. She has also held leadership roles as COO of Groupon, EVP of US Card Services and CMO of Discover Financial Services, and was a partner at McKinsey in London and Chicago. Margo has championed organizations that inspire girls to pursue education opportunities and careers in STEM and the next generation of women leaders. She is a recipient of many awards including the Forbes “Excellence Award in Innovation,” Chicago Innovation’s “Visionary Award”, the POW! Womenetics “Purposeful Women Award,” the Eastman Medal from the University of Rochester, Executive of the Year in Utah, and was named to Fortune’s “50 Most Powerful Women in Business” list. Margo serves on the Board of Directors of McDonald’s Corporation. She earned a BA in Economics and an MBA from Harvard.
Howard Hochhauser joined Ancestry in 2009 as Chief Financial Officer and in February 2012 added the position of Chief Operating Officer. Howard also served as interim CEO of Ancestry from October 2017 to May 2018 while the Board conducted a comprehensive search for a permanent CEO. During his tenure, Howard has helped lead the Company’s initial 2009 public offering, its go-private transaction in 2012, seven acquisitions and all of its public equity and debt financings. He was part of the team that helped grow the company from approximately $200 million in revenue in 2008, to more than $1 billion in revenue in 2017, a compound annual growth rate of over 21%. Prior to joining Ancestry, Howard served as Chief Financial Officer of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, and earlier in his career was a Vice President of Equity Research at Bear Stearns & Co. and a Staff Accountant at KPMG Peat Marwick. Howard has received numerous awards, including Best CEO of 2018 by the Utah Technology Council, #1 Internet industry CFO of 2012 by Institutional Investor magazine and CFO of the year in 2012 by Utah Business Magazine. He serves on the board of Silicon Slopes and on the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors of Envision Utah. He is a Certified Public Accountant and holds an M.B.A. from Columbia University and a B.S. from Boston University.
Catherine Ball, Ph.D. has served as Chief Scientific Officer for AncestryDNA, LLC since September 2016. She joined Ancestry in 2011 as Vice President of Genomics and Bioinformatics, helping to establish the Company’s approach to genetic genealogy leading to the launch of AncestryDNA. Cathy is a genomic scientist who has annotated and mined the genomes of various organisms and created resources to help clinicians, citizens and other scientists exploit and explore genome data. Her career has focused on helping people around the world appreciate, understand and use their own genomic data. Cathy has collaborated on the annotation of the first sequenced eukaryotic genome (brewer's yeast) and has collaboratively built databases to explore the genomes of yeast, E. coli and the bacterium that causes tuberculosis. As a pioneer in data analysis resources for high-throughput biomedical technologies, she led the Stanford Microarray Database, the largest academic database of its kind. Cathy has used high-throughput biomedical data to shed light on diverse research topics, from the biology of infectious organisms to the mechanisms involved in cell division and cancer. She has presented seminars at leading universities and contributes to National Institutes of Health committees. She received a B.S. in Biology and a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from the University of California, Los Angeles. Cathy was a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley prior to her research in the Departments of Genetics and Biochemistry at Stanford University School of Medicine.
Ken Chahine has served as our Executive Vice President and General Manager for AncestryDNA, LLC since April 2015. He joined the Company as General Manager and Senior Vice President for AncestryDNA, LLC in July of 2011. Prior to joining us, he held several positions, including as Chief Executive Officer of Avigen, a biotechnology company in the Department of Human Genetics at the University of Utah, and at Parke-Davis Pharmaceuticals (currently Pfizer). Ken also teaches a course focused on new venture development, intellectual property, and licensing at the University of Utah's College of Law. He earned a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of Michigan, a J.D. from the University of Utah College of Law, and a B.A. in Chemistry from Florida State University.
Mike Linton joined Ancestry as Chief Revenue Officer in September 2019, to lead consumer and product marketing with a focus on accelerating growth and continuing to build a global brand that consumers love and trust. Prior to Ancestry, he served as CMO of Farmers Insurance where his responsibilities included marketing, research, strategic planning, internal and external communications, customer experience and the company’s digital and mobile efforts. In his 30-year marketing and general management career Mike has also worked at Procter & Gamble, Progressive Insurance, BestBuy and eBay, to name a few. Linton is on the Board of Directors of Medical Solutions and The Wine Group and advises a number of early stage companies. Among numerous awards, Linton has won 4 Effies, a Valiente and was named by Ad Age as one of the most influential 30 marketers. In 2017, he was named one of the 50 Most Innovative CMO’s in the World by Business Insider. Linton received his degree from Bowling Green State University and Duke's Fuqua School of Business.
Julie Miller joined Ancestry in August 2019 as senior vice president, Chief Communications Officer, responsible for leading strategic communications and promoting the overall reputation of Ancestry with authentic, transparent and engaging storytelling. Julie is an accomplished senior executive with extensive experience developing impactful and integrated communications strategies to drive growth. Passionate about leadership and developing world-class, highly motivated teams, Julie has a proven track delivering successful global communications programs to build brand equity and trust, increase consideration and amplify the business to internal and external audiences. Prior to joining Ancestry, Julie served as vice president of Corporate Communications at Intuit, Inc. where she led communications for Intuit’s corporate brand and flagship consumer brands, including TurboTax. Julie also deep expertise in reputation management, executive positioning, public affairs and financial communications. Before joining Intuit, Julie held multiple communications leadership roles in consumer, healthcare and high-tech in both corporate and agency environments including Anacomp, Inc. and Sharp Healthcare Systems. She holds a bachelor’s degree in communication from the University of California, San Diego and an MBA from San Diego State University with an emphasis in Marketing.
Nat Natarajan has served as our Executive Vice President and Chief Product and Technology Officer since February 2017. Prior to Ancestry, Nat held executive positions in technology and product development at Intuit and PayPal. He was also one of the early members on the team that founded Travelocity.com, totaling more than 20 years of experience building highly innovative products and successful teams. At PayPal, Nat managed and led significant growth during his tenure. He was a key executive in PayPal’s merchant services business that was about 60 percent of PayPal’s revenues in 2014. He led global engineering, operations and platforms teams at PayPal. As Chief Technology Officer and senior vice president of product management and engineering for Intuit’s Consumer Tax Group, Natarajan helped to shape their product and technology roadmap, accelerate the pace of innovation and build a world-class product leadership team. He speaks regularly at technology forums and has served on multiple panels related to product innovation, agile technologies and leading transformations. Natarajan has a Master of Science degree in industrial engineering from Clemson University and a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering from Jawaharlal Nehru Technology University in India.
Carla S. Newell has served as Chief Legal Officer and Chief Risk Officer for Ancestry since September 2016. She has worked with companies covering a wide range of sectors including cyber security, enterprise software and services, ecommerce and social media, witnessing the evolution in business models across these sectors and their impact on more traditional businesses. Prior to joining Ancestry, Carla spent more than a decade as Operating General Partner at Technology Crossover Ventures (TCV), a leading growth equity investor, where she led legal, investor relations and fundraising for the firm and its multi-billion dollar funds. Among TCV's portfolio companies are many of the world's most successful and recognizable consumer technology brands, including Expedia, Facebook, Fandango, Netflix, Spotify, and Zillow. Additionally, Carla is an expert in structuring and negotiating complex business, investment and strategic transactions, including M&A. Prior to Technology Crossover Ventures she spent 15 years working with high growth technology companies as a Partner at two leading technology focused law firms, Gunderson Dettmer Stough Villeneuve Franklin & Hachigian LLP and Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich. Carla earned a Juris Doctorate from The University of Michigan Law School and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Chicago.
Evan Wittenberg has served as Executive Vice President and Chief People Officer at Ancestry since July 2017. He oversees the company’s People and Places team, which is responsible for all HR functions including talent acquisition and development, total rewards, facilities and leadership development. Wittenberg has an extensive track record of helping world-class organizations grow and foster their talent while evolving their cultures to support continued expansion. Prior to Ancestry, Wittenberg served as Chief People Officer at Box, having led the company’s Human Resources function through explosive growth and a public listing in 2015. In his leadership role, he oversaw all recruiting and talent development initiatives, in addition to compensation and benefits, performance management and succession planning. Prior to Box, Wittenberg was the Chief Talent Officer for HP; created and ran the Global Leadership Development function at Google; was Director of the Graduate Leadership Program at The Wharton School; and was part of the cultural integration of two world class academic medical centers which created New York Presbyterian Hospital – The University Hospital of Columbia and Cornell. Evan received his BA with Distinction in Psychology and English Literature from Swarthmore College, and his M.B.A. with Honors from the Wharton School, specializing in Strategic Change Leadership.