The co-founder of Google X and the ex-head of technology at Nest, has been scooped up by another big name in tech, Apple.
Reports indicate that Yoky Matsuoka will be developing Apple’s health technology projects, including HealthKit, ResearchKit and CareKit, and will report directly to Apple’s COO Jeff Williams.
Matsuoka has had a dynamic career since coming to the United States from Japan. After working in technology for six years, Matsuoka went on to spend 10 years in academia at both Carnegie Mellon and the University of Washington.
Furthermore, in 2007, she won a MacArthur Foundation genius grant for her work in neurorobotics.
Between 2009 and 2010, as the Head of Innovation at Google, she co-founded Google’s X Labs, which went on to develop self-driving cars.
She spent only a year at Google before making the move to Nest Labs as one of the company’s founding members. She served as the vice president of technology at Nest for five years where a student of hers during her time at Carnegie Mellon, Matt Rogers, was a co-founder.
Nest was acquired by Google in 2014 for $3.2 billion USD, and Matsuoka left the company last year to take a job with Twitter.
However, before her role at Twitter even began, she decided to forfeit the position on account of being diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. She stated in a post on Medium that though she was taking some time off, she eventually wanted to return to technology.
In that post, she also stated that she’d overcome her health concerns and was at work on some personal projects. It’s been a year since Matsuoka made that announcement, and Apple’s since become the latest tech company to land on her padded resume.
In her post on Medium last year, Matsuoka stated that she’d be thinking very carefully about what her next steps would be.
“I can’t imagine leaving the world of technology and what has been a passion for me. I want to work again, but also want to take time to construct this new life I have been so blessed to be given.”
Related Reading: Google could be launching an incubator in the hopes of retaining top talent
[source]Fortune[/source]
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