Yaccarino

Linda Yaccarino
Born	Template:Birth year and age
Nationality	American
Occupation	Business executive
Title	Chief Executive Officer, eMed Population Health
Employer	eMed Population Health
Known for	CEO of X Corp. (formerly Twitter), Chairman of Global Advertising and Partnerships at NBCUniversal

Linda Yaccarino (born 1963) is an American media and business executive who served as the chief executive officer (CEO) of X Corp., the social media company formerly known as Twitter, from 2023 to 2025. Appointed by Elon Musk following his acquisition of the platform, Yaccarino became one of the most prominent figures in the technology and digital media industries during a period of significant upheaval at the company. Prior to her tenure at X, she built a lengthy career in media advertising, most notably as Chairman of Global Advertising and Partnerships at NBCUniversal, where she was responsible for generating billions of dollars in annual advertising revenue. Her role at X placed her at the intersection of social media, content moderation policy, and advertiser relations, as she navigated the challenge of retaining major brands on a platform undergoing rapid and often controversial transformation under Musk's ownership. After stepping down as CEO of X in July 2025, Yaccarino was named CEO of eMed Population Health, a digital health company, in August 2025.

Career

NBCUniversal

Before joining X Corp., Linda Yaccarino spent over a decade at NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast, where she rose to the position of Chairman of Global Advertising and Partnerships. In this role, she oversaw the company's advertising sales operations across its portfolio of television networks, digital properties, and streaming platforms. Her work at NBCUniversal established her reputation as one of the most influential figures in the media advertising industry. Yaccarino was credited with modernizing NBCUniversal's advertising business and pioneering new approaches to how brands interacted with content across linear television and digital media.

During her tenure at NBCUniversal, Yaccarino was responsible for negotiating and securing advertising deals worth billions of dollars annually. She played a central role in the company's upfront presentations — the annual events at which television networks pitch their upcoming programming schedules to advertisers — and was instrumental in developing new advertising formats and measurement tools designed to bridge the gap between traditional television advertising and the evolving digital landscape.

CEO of X Corp.

In June 2023, Elon Musk announced that he had hired Yaccarino to serve as the CEO of X Corp., the company that operated the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. Musk had completed his acquisition of Twitter in October 2022, and the platform underwent a series of dramatic changes in the months that followed, including widespread layoffs, policy shifts, and its rebranding from Twitter to X. Yaccarino's appointment was seen as an effort to stabilize the company's relationships with advertisers, many of whom had paused or reduced their spending on the platform amid concerns about content moderation policies under Musk's ownership.

As CEO, Yaccarino served as the public-facing leader of X, while Musk retained significant influence over the company's direction as its owner and chief technology officer. Yaccarino's primary mandate centered on rebuilding the company's advertising revenue, which had declined substantially following Musk's takeover. She worked to reassure major brands that X remained a safe and effective platform for advertising, meeting with agency executives and brand leaders to address concerns about the types of content appearing alongside their advertisements.

Yaccarino's tenure at X was marked by a series of challenges. The platform faced ongoing advertiser boycotts and concerns about the proliferation of hate speech and misinformation. The company also contended with competition from rival social media platforms, including Threads, launched by Meta Platforms in July 2023, and Bluesky, which attracted users who had left Twitter. Yaccarino announced several partnerships and initiatives aimed at diversifying X's revenue streams and attracting new users and advertisers to the platform.

One such initiative was an exclusive partnership with Paris Hilton and her media company 11:11, which Yaccarino announced publicly. The partnership was part of a broader strategy to bring high-profile content creators and media brands onto the X platform, positioning it as a destination for premium and exclusive content rather than solely a text-based social network.

Throughout her time as CEO, Yaccarino was frequently called upon to defend the company's policies and Musk's public statements, which at times created friction with advertisers and the broader public. She appeared before a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, representing the company in discussions about social media's role in society. The dual nature of her role — serving as the company's chief executive while Musk maintained operational control and frequently made unilateral public statements about the platform — created an unusual corporate dynamic that drew significant media attention.

The challenges Yaccarino faced included navigating controversies surrounding X's artificial intelligence chatbot, Grok, which generated posts that were widely criticized for containing extremist content, including Nazi-related imagery and rhetoric. These incidents further complicated Yaccarino's efforts to position X as a brand-safe environment for advertisers.

Departure from X

On July 9, 2025, Yaccarino announced that she was stepping down as CEO of X after approximately two years in the role. Her departure came after a period of sustained challenges at the company, including ongoing advertiser concerns, content moderation controversies, and the difficulties inherent in balancing her leadership role with Musk's continued involvement in the company's operations.

Multiple media outlets analyzed the factors that may have contributed to Yaccarino's decision to leave. Reporting by Poynter cited the cumulative toll of placating advertisers, defending Musk's public statements, and dealing with controversies such as the Grok chatbot's extremist content as potential contributing factors. The Guardian reported that Yaccarino announced her departure after two years as chief executive officer.

AOL reported that Yaccarino was "leaving Elon Musk's X after two years as CEO," characterizing her departure as the conclusion of a challenging period leading the social media company.

eMed Population Health

Shortly after her departure from X, Yaccarino was appointed as the new CEO of eMed Population Health, a digital health company. The appointment was announced on August 5, 2025.

eMed Population Health described itself as a global leader in population health management. The company's announcement stated that Yaccarino's hire was intended to accelerate the company's growth. CNBC reported that Yaccarino "stepped down as CEO of Elon Musk's social" media company before taking on the new role.

CNN reported that Yaccarino's new leadership position was at a company operating in "the weight loss space," placing eMed's operations within the broader context of the growing digital health and wellness industry. The move represented a significant career shift for Yaccarino, transitioning from the social media and advertising sectors that had defined her career to the health technology industry.

The appointment attracted widespread media coverage, reflecting the high profile Yaccarino had maintained throughout her career and particularly during her tenure at X. News outlets including CNBC, CNN, and numerous other publications covered the announcement, underscoring the level of public interest in Yaccarino's career trajectory following her time leading one of the world's most discussed social media platforms.

Public Profile and Media Attention

Throughout her career, Yaccarino has attracted significant media attention, particularly during her tenure as CEO of X. The unique circumstances of her role — leading a major social media platform while its owner, Elon Musk, maintained an unusually public and hands-on presence — made her one of the most closely watched executives in the technology industry.

Her appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee placed her in the national spotlight beyond the business press, bringing her into the broader public discourse about social media regulation, content moderation, and the responsibilities of platform operators. Yaccarino's testimony and public statements during this period reflected the tension between her role as the company's chief executive and the realities of operating under an owner who frequently made independent pronouncements about the platform's direction and policies.

Media coverage of Yaccarino's time at X frequently focused on the advertiser relations challenges she faced. The departure of major brands from the platform, and her efforts to bring them back, became a recurring narrative in business and technology journalism. Her ability to leverage her deep relationships in the advertising industry — built during her years at NBCUniversal — was seen as her primary asset in the role, though the extent to which she was able to fully reverse the advertising decline at X remained a subject of ongoing analysis.

Following her departure from X and appointment at eMed, coverage shifted to analysis of her tenure's legacy at the social media company and speculation about the direction of her career. The speed with which she secured a new CEO position — less than a month after leaving X — indicated the continued demand for her leadership experience in the corporate world, despite the challenges she had faced at the social media platform.

Legacy

Yaccarino's career spans two distinct eras of the media and technology industries. Her long tenure at NBCUniversal positioned her as one of the leading figures in the transformation of television advertising from a purely linear model to a cross-platform approach encompassing digital and streaming content. Her subsequent move to X Corp. placed her at the center of one of the most consequential and controversial chapters in social media history.

Her two years as CEO of X represented an unusual case study in corporate leadership: a seasoned media executive brought in to stabilize and grow a company undergoing radical transformation under a highly visible and opinionated owner. The challenges she navigated — from advertiser boycotts and content moderation controversies to competition from emerging rival platforms and the management of an AI chatbot that generated extremist content — highlighted the complexities of leading a social media company in an era of heightened scrutiny over the role of technology platforms in public discourse.

Her transition to the digital health sector with eMed Population Health marked a new chapter in her career, bringing her leadership and executive experience to an entirely different industry. The appointment suggested that her professional reputation remained strong despite the turbulent circumstances of her time at X, and that her skills in building partnerships, managing large organizations, and navigating complex stakeholder relationships were valued across industry boundaries.