Former Yahoo Exec Appointed COO of Ripple Labs

Ripple Labs has appointed former Yahoo and AOL executive Brad Garlinghouse as its new COO.

Garlinghouse, who sits on the board of Ancestry.com, became the CEO of file-sharing firm Hightail in 2012. He departed last fall following a dispute over a potential sale of the company, as reported at the time by Re/code.

In a press statement about his new role, Garlinghouse said:

"There is already incredible momentum for Ripple as a new infrastructure for global payments, and the opportunity to define the actual framework for the Internet of Value is an order of magnitude bigger than anything else underway in payments today."

The move comes weeks after Ripple Labs tapped former US State Department official Anja Manuel to work as an advisor. Former National Economic Council director Gene Sperling joined the company’s board of directors in January.

Garlinghouse made headlines in 2006 after an internal Yahoo memo he penned was leaked and subsequently published. In the document, termed the 'peanut butter manifesto', he criticized the company’s lack of focus and called for a number of changes, including staff cuts.

Correction: A previous version of this article stated that Brad Garlinghouse was Ripple's CEO. He is COO, Chris Larsen remains the company's CEO.