Dallas-based Nirav Tolia returns to CEO role at Nextdoor » Dallas innovates

Nirav Tolia [Image: Courtesy photo; Nextdoor; DI Studio]

Dallas-based Nirav Tolia is back at the helm. Nextdoor is a San Francisco-based neighborhood social network with over 330,000 locations in 11 countries.

Mr. Toria, who co-founded the company in 2008 with Sarah Leary, Prakash Janakiraman and David Wiesen, served as the company's CEO for almost eight years before retiring in 2018. At that time, he was replaced by Sarah Friar. He is the former CFO of Square Inc.

Nextdoor announced in February that Mr. Friar himself would step down from his roles as CEO, president and chairman of the board in the second quarter, with Mr. Trier returning to serve in all three roles.

Since Friar became CEO in 2018, Nextdoor's audience has nearly tripled to more than 88 million “verified neighbors.” However, the company, which went public through a $4.3 billion SPAC merger in 2021, has seen its stock price slump in recent years since peaking in November 2021. Nevertheless, 2023 was a year of improvement under Friar's leadership. In his year-end report, he highlighted “new strength and positive momentum” in the fourth quarter, with accelerated user growth, 3% year-over-year revenue growth and early gains from cost reductions for businesses. Pointed out the benefits. Additionally, Nextdoor announced that it would increase its stock repurchase program by $150 million, demonstrating confidence in its long-term prospects.

Now, Tria is resuming leadership with a vision for the future.

“Today, I feel the same excitement and potential that I had when I founded this company 14 years ago,” Tria wrote on LinkedIn on Wednesday. “While Nextdoor has grown significantly since then, we believe our best days are clearly still ahead.”

Nextdoor adds former Yahoo CEO and others to board of directors

Building on this optimism and strengthening its leadership team, Nextdoor recently announced the addition of several prominent executives to its board of directors.

“We just announced a productive first quarter,” Toria added. “And we are pleased to welcome Marissa Mayer (Sunshine, Yahoo), Niraj Shah (Wayfair) and Robert Homan (Glassdoor) to our board, all with substantial founder/product-focused leadership experience. CEO to bring to Nextdoor.”

The integration of these new board members is part of Nextdoor's broader leadership transformation, which began with Tolia's return as CEO. He emphasized his continuity and enthusiasm in a statement in February.

“I'm excited to return to Nextdoor, the company I founded to bring neighbors around the world closer together,” he said. “I am extremely grateful to Sarah for her outstanding leadership over the past five years, during which time Nextdoor became a publicly traded company, built a strong balance sheet, and expanded its business globally. I love working with them and look forward to working with them over the coming weeks to ensure a smooth transition into the next phase of Nextdoor.”

Toria is one half of Dallas' power duo

Megha and Nirav Toria [Photo: SMU]

Tria, who grew up in West Texas, moved back to Texas with her family in 2021. He and his wife, Megha, president and COO of his global television production company, Shondaland, moved to Dallas' Park City neighborhood, not far from Southern Methodist. University. That made the commute easier in 2023 when they were named co-founding directors of the new William S. Spears Institute for Entrepreneurial Leadership at SMU's Cox School of Business.

Tria gave a keynote speech at Dallas Startup Week last fall.

Last September, Tolia gave a keynote speech at Dallas Startup Week with Capital One's Kamlesh Talreja. Tolia recalled how a setback at an Internet company he helped start led him to found Nextdoor.com. He also talked about why so many people, including his wife and himself, choose to move to North Texas.

“So many people are moving here. It's a great place to live,” he said. “You can raise your family here. You can afford to be here. We shouldn't take these things for granted because they are the same as other countries in the country, if not around the world. Because it doesn't exist in most places.”

At Dallas Startup Week, he compared Dallas' entrepreneurial environment to that of Silicon Valley.

“The idea that you can start a company and it can have 100 million daily users or $100 billion in revenue is something that people really believe in Silicon Valley,” Tria said. Ta. “Do we still believe that in Dallas?” I know some people in this room are thinking that, but we collectively need to see more success. So it's really important that we move forward with this, given the natural assets that we have. ”

“There's a long tradition of entrepreneurship here,” he added. “There are already giants in this region. There is incredible optimism and positive attitude among the people of this region. All the ingredients are there. It will take a lot of hard work and a lot of courage. “I guess so,” he said. “And if you have some success, that success will breed more success. And this thing will move on.”

Quincy Preston contributed to this report.