Peter Thiel retreating from Silicon Valley's tech scene

Another of his firms, the venture capital firm Founders Fund, will remain in San Francisco, the person said.

Thiel - whose net worth is $US2.5 billion, according to Forbes - also has discussed with people close to him the possibility of resigning from Facebook's board.

The plans were first reported Thursday by the Wall Street Journal. Thiel Capital spokesman Jeremiah Hall declined to comment.

Then US President-elect Donald Trump, left, speaks while Peter Thiel, billionaire co-founder of PayPal Inc. and a member of Donald Trump’s transition team, listens.

Photo: Bloomberg

Thiel also funded a massive libel lawsuit on behalf of former wrestling star Hulk Hogan that shut down the website Gawker, years after Gawker disclosed that Thiel is gay. A Florida jury awarded $US140 million to Hogan in 2016; the suit later was settled for $US31 million.

Thiel, an avowed libertarian, has made no apologies for his support of Trump. He said in 2016 that he was surprised by what he called a "visceral reaction" in socially liberal Silicon Valley to his support of the president.

More recently, Thiel has said the Bay Area tech industry has become increasingly intolerant of conservative political views. "Silicon Valley is a one-party state," he said in January during an appearance at Stanford University.

Southern California is a bastion of liberalism and Democratic support too, but it is also where some of the bigger names in conservative media - such as the Drudge Report, Breitbart News and the Daily Wire - got their start. Plus, Trump's Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, senior advisor Stephen Miller and former chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon have backgrounds in Hollywood.

In addition to PayPal and Facebook, Thiel made early investments in Elon Musk's rocket maker Space Exploration Technologies Inc., or SpaceX, in 2008. He also helped launch Palo Alto software company Palantir Technologies Inc., which makes powerful data-analytics software used by military and intelligence agencies as well as commercial companies.

According to the person familiar with his thinking, Thiel's interest in moving to Los Angeles also stems from his view that the region's technology efforts are expanding, as illustrated by Hawthorne-based SpaceX and Snapchat maker Snap Inc., which is based in Venice.

Thiel, who earned an undergraduate degree and a law degree from Stanford University, also is among those who have questioned whether everyone with interests in high-tech inventions and entrepreneurship needs an expensive college education.

To that end, his Thiel Foundation offers a fellowship to young people who skip or drop out of college, offering $US100,000 grants so they can pursue their ideas and business plans.

TNS

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Bagikan Berita Ini