Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) CEO and President Dana White will join Meta's board of directors, the social media company announced Monday.
White is part of a trio of new additions to the Meta board, along with John Elkann, CEO of Exor and chairman of Stellantis and Ferrari, and tech investor Charlie Songhurst. be.
“Dana, John, and Charlie will add deep expertise and perspective that will help us address the huge opportunities presented by the future of AI, wearables, and human connectivity,” said Meta CEO Mark. Zuckerberg said in a statement.
The three businessmen include Zuckerberg, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, Dropbox co-founder and CEO Drew Houston, Broadcom president and CEO Hock Tan, and DoorDash CEO Co-founder and CEO Tony Hsu and others have joined the board of directors.
“Prior to receiving the offer to join Meta's board, I had no interest in joining the board,” White said in a statement. “I strongly believe that social media and AI are the future.”
“I am very excited to join this great team and learn more about this business from the inside,” he continued. “There's nothing I love more than building brands, and I look forward to helping take Meta to the next level.”
The head of the UFC is a longtime friend of President-elect Trump. He joined Trump at Mar-a-Lago in November to watch the announcement of the election results and speak alongside the Republican candidate on stage after declaring victory.
“There's no one who deserves this more than him, and there's no one who deserves this more than his family,” White said at the time.
Mr. Zuckerberg has had a difficult relationship with Mr. Trump for many years, but it seems that he wants to mend his relationship with the president-elect when he returns to office. Mehta's CEO visited President Trump at Mar-a-Lago in November, and his company subsequently donated $1 million to President Trump's inaugural fund.
Other technology leaders are taking similar approaches. Amazon contributed $1 million to the founding fund, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman poured the same amount out of his personal fortune.
