David Bonderman, who was named last week as a major investor in the effort to bring an NHL franchise to Seattle, was forced to resign from the board of Uber on Tuesday in the aftermath of an “inappropriate” comment made to fellow board member Arianna Huffington during a company wide meeting. The gathering was to discuss the problem of harassment toward women.
The Washington Post reports the following exchange between Bonderman and Huffington.
“There’s a lot of data that shows when there’s one woman on the board, it’s much more likely that there will be a second woman on the board,” said Huffington, according to several people who heard the remarks.
“Actually,” Bonderman interjected, “what it shows is, it’s much likely there'll be more talking.”
“Oh, come on, David,” Huffington said, in between awkward laughs. Addressing the crowd, she added, “Don't worry, David will have a lot of talking to do, as well.”
Bonderman later apologized for the remark both to Huffington personally and to Uber employees in a company-wide email. According to the Washington Post article, Huffington acknowledged the apology.
“David has apologized to all Uber employees for a remark that was totally inappropriate and against the new culture we are building at Uber,” Huffington said in a statement.
Later in the day, Bonderman resigned with the following statement.
Uber is examining the issues with its culture, and making significant changes and working to right what has been done wrong, which is extremely important for the future of the company. I do not want my comments to create distraction as Uber works to build a culture of which we can be proud. I need to hold myself to the same standards that we’re asking Uber to adopt.
Huffington released this statement in response.
I appreciate David doing the right thing for Uber at this time of critical cultural changes at the company.
While it’s good that Bonderman rightfully apologized and took tangible responsibility for the remark, it’s also unfortunate that the remark was made in the first place. Hopefully, he will prove this to be an anomoly.
Comments
Awww man.
I don’t want our NHL guy to be a liability. I bet the NHL BOGs would have reservations about giving that kind of a guy a team. I agree. Let’s hope this is an anomaly.
By 206er on 06.13.17 11:05pm
At least he's just the minority owner for an NHL team
I would be surprised if it was difficult to replace his bucks.
By NWEastcoaster on 06.14.17 5:21am
Who said he was going to be a minority owner?
Bruckheimer and Bonderman are teamed up for a majority ownership of an NHL team.
By Matt Tucker on 06.14.17 7:15am
As in Bruckheimer majority owner of NHL team, Bonderman, minority owner of NHL team
By NWEastcoaster on 06.14.17 7:29pm
Too late. . The horse is out of the barn. I hope OVG drops him. The optics won't be good in light of what happened here after the Occ vote.
There’s really no way to backpedal from that comment. The inference he was making was crystal clear.
By kinsesu on 06.13.17 11:28pm
Good riddance
I prefer a younger owner anyway.
By Ultrasonics on 06.13.17 11:36pm
I want an owner that can get us teams. Period.
I’ve gotta think that the SCC will be putting an enormous amount of pressure on OVG to drop him. They’d look like total hypocrites if he stays on with OVG. How the league’s handle this will be interesting since he’s a minority owner with the Celtics.
By kinsesu on 06.13.17 11:47pm
Is he
An investor in OVGs key rebuild proposal or strictly interested in any hockey team that may come along?
If he is strictly on the hockey side of things I don’t see how this affects OVGs proposal. They will just dump him and find someone else. Everyone assumes it won’t be hard to find potential team owners. If he had some investment in the actual key rebuild it might make things a little awkward. OVG will have to find someone else who is willing to have some "skin in the game"
By Jaxsyn on 06.14.17 12:05am
Ownership group. I don't think he's involved with OVG's Key remodel. At least as far as I know.
So. . .. yeah, maybe Bruckheimer goes it alone or brings in another partner(s). It appears he could certainly afford it.
By kinsesu on 06.14.17 12:19am
I'll Bet...
… he gets along well with Dolan. Yeesh.
By MartinHughes on 06.14.17 2:05am
Unacceptable.
By Slica on 06.14.17 3:01am
interesting NHL-related tidbit
sorry if someone has posted this elsewhere on SR already
https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian/2017/06/13/arizona-coyotes-owner-andrew-barroway-buys-out-partners-for-240-million/#2478669c178b
By Todd Little on 06.14.17 5:54am
the team is worth $240 million, not that Barroway paid $240 million
First, the valuation. The deal that was announced yesterday in which Barroway bought out the partners that owned 49% of the Coyotes valued the team at $240 million, the precise valuation we placed on the hockey team this past November.
…
But Barroway and the Coyotes are now leveraged to the hilt. As of now, the Coyotes have $250 million of debt. There is $100 million of NHL debt and two loans from MGG Investment Group; one for $100 million with about a 10% interest rate and a payment-in-kind loan for $50 million that would be redeemed in six years for $100 million.
On top of that leverage, the team is losing a lot of money. During the 2016-17 season, the Coyotes posted negative operating income (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) of about $20 million. Interest expenses brought the cash loss to roughly $27 million.
By Jeff - j1012 on 06.14.17 8:57am
Won't stay in Glendale long term...but will not move out of Arizona
By bgramer on 06.14.17 5:58am
This is what gets you in hot water nowadays?
If you listen to the whole audio clip, he is obviously joking. Not a good joke, but to crucify him over that little comment is ridiculous. The world has gone too P.C.
For the record I am pro Sodo. If OVG drops him over this one comment, that will be idiotic. If Bonderman has shown a pattern of this behavior, then his dismissal is completely understandable. But if it’s one bad joke…get real.
By bosshogg18 on 06.14.17 7:45am
The entire meeting...
Was focused on the culture issues at Uber. If you don’t want to hold him accountable for the joke…hold him accountable for being too dumb to know that it wasn’t a joke that should be made.
By blykmyk44 on 06.14.17 1:28pm
Bonderman's comment was dumb and tone death
Inappropriate at any forum given the contextual inference of the value women bring to boards, but particularly egregious considering the context of where Uber is at as a company and that it was made at a forum on culture change within a Company that has been accused of having a frat-boy culture.
But he/she who casts the first stone… I mean, are we really at a point in society where a person who has a career full of doing the right thing should be ostracized for one dumb off-the-cuff joke about gender-bias? If that’s the case, one could argue that it’s hypocritical to not also be saying that Hansen should be steeping aside his equally dumb decision to funnel money to an anti-Sacramento arena law firm. Everyone makes mistakes. Make the mistake twice and it changes things. A ~ 40 year career full of positives should not be torn down by this one moment of poor judgement. This isn’t a Don Imus moment. Look at the body of work. Resigning from the Uber board was the right call, given the situation. Trying to say that he should be removed from OVG group because of it is just a gross overreach. David Bonderman wasn’t part of the problem at Uber. He just made a really f’ing stupid comment.
By ksmith1984 on 06.14.17 7:49am
tone-deaf <img src="//fonts.voxmedia.com/emoji/unicode/1f60a.png" alt=":blush:" class="emoji">
By ksmith1984 on 06.14.17 7:54am
I think that was Jon Humbert's point with his tweet yesterday, actually.
I asked him about that, because to me it seemed like he was trying to equate this with AEG’s scandal and Hansen’s campaign violation. Seemed very apples and oranges. He basically responded saying all three were bad eggs.
By Drunk Viking on 06.14.17 7:57am
And that was the problem I had with it....
To me it almost looked like Humbert was trying to say "no, we can’t have nice things (an arena) because all the people wanting to build one are bad actors." That’s what irritated me, and I’m sure some of you, about that tweet.
What Bonderman said I feel was pretty dumb, too. Should he be removed from the bid? I’d have to say under normal circumstances no, but things like this do matter – see AEG with the Anschutz donations to the anti-LGBT groups and our issues out of the vote last May – in this political environment we live in here in Seattle. It’ll be curious to see how the five ladies on the Council respond.
By snovalleyhockeyfan on 06.14.17 9:29am
Humbert is a known instigator.
He definitely likes to stir the pot in the way he writes.
By Otto Rogers on 06.14.17 10:06am
He Is
And that’s why I call him Dumbert
By SonicsFan197879 on 06.14.17 10:58am
He most definitely did
As I noted before, I would suggest to Levine he tell his colleague to knock it off. No reason to try and be TV’s Geoff Baker.
By snovalleyhockeyfan on 06.14.17 11:03am
IMO, they only fly the feminist flag when it provides convenient political CYA.
It’s ok to be sexist if you’re a billionaire helping them win their arena fight.
Fake feminism just makes me want to puke.
By JetCityWoman2 on 06.14.17 3:54pm
Comparing the two...
Seem silly…I guess you could argue both guys made dumb decisions. But one dumb decision is much different than the other in context.
By blykmyk44 on 06.14.17 1:34pm