Twitch CEO Emmett Shear Announces Resignation

Longtime Twitch CEO Emmett Shear announced his resignation from the position this week with Dan Clancy, the company's current president, set to take over the role. Shear announced his decision to step down in a lengthy blog post shared on Twitch's site that recounted first the history of Twitch and his time with the company before confirming his plans to resign alongside a reason for the resignation.

Though Twitch officially launched in 2011, Shear said his work with Twitch began back in 2006 when the ideas for Justin.tv and later Twitch itself were just starting to come together. Shear co-founded Justin.tv with Justin Kan, Michael Seibel, and Kyle Vogt with Twitch later born from that initial livestreaming venture. Shear became the CEO of Twitch in 2011.

Now, however, he's passing on that role to Clancy who's been with Twitch since 2019. In his departure note, Shear said his resignation was tied in part to the birth of his first child. He said in the same set of thoughts that he won't be leaving Twitch entirely and will stay on with the company "in an advisory role."

"With my first child just born, I've been reflecting on my future with Twitch. Twitch often feels to me like a child I've been raising as well," Shear said. "And while I will always want to be there if Twitch needs me, at 16 years old it feels to me Twitch is ready to move out of the house and venture alone. So it is with great poignancy that I share my decision to resign from Twitch as CEO. I want to be fully there for my son as he enters this world and I feel ready for this change to tackle new challenges. I will continue to work at Twitch in an advisory role."

In his parting words, Shear also vouched for Clancy who we'll imagine we'll be hearing more from in the future in light of this transition.

"Dan Clancy, our current President, has been a close partner to me these past few years. He will step fully into the role of CEO, effective immediately. He cares deeply about the Twitch community, its streamers, and our staff and understands what makes Twitch, Twitch."