Susan Wojcicki did not behave like she had terminal cancer 3 weeks prior to her death.

She accepted and advertised her new board position at a public company, Planet Labs PBC, and is still listed as a Director on the company investor-facing website.

This is a short post, just to document this interesting fact.

On July 15, 2024, about 3 weeks prior to her death on August 9 from a 2-year bout of lung cancer, Susan Wojcicki did not behave like she was terminally ill. On the contrary, she was planning to be a board member of a publicly traded company (a pretty significant commitment of time, effort and energy). A friend of mine recently passed away from a covid shot-induced cancer, and 3 weeks prior to passing there is no way he would have been able to do a business conference call, much less participate in a board meeting of a public company.

This information was verified via a source who knows a senior exec at Planet Labs PBC.

SAN FRANCISCO, July 15, 2024--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Planet Labs PBC (NYSE: PL), a leading provider of daily data and insights about Earth, announced Susan Wojcicki has been appointed to Planet’s Board of Directors. With over two decades of leadership experience in the technology industry helping to scale disruptive companies, Planet believes Ms. Wojcicki is uniquely positioned to support the Company’s continued growth and scalability across markets as an independent director.

Susan was voted in at Planet’s Annual General Meeting on July 11. This is the company’s second board addition since going public in December 2021, following Kristen Robinson’s appointment in November 2022.

"Susan has an incredibly impressive career scaling technology companies," said Will Marshall, co-founder and CEO of Planet. "Planet has huge ambition, which we’ve only tapped a small fraction of to date, so Susan’s experience will help us in both strategy and tactics as we grow and scale Planet’s business. I look forward to working together."

Nobody at Planet Labs realized that Wojcicki was in the terminal stages of cancer. She was voted-in as a board member at the Annual General Meeting on July 11. I assume she was absent at that meeting, and sent some sort of an agent/representative instead. However, she provided a quote for the press release, seemingly completely fine and feeling able to serve as a board member for a hugely ambitious growth company:

"This is an exciting time for Planet’s business. With the launch of the Tanager and Pelican satellites this year, growth of AI capabilities, and rollout of the recent Planet Insights Platform, Planet is on the edge of scaling in a big way," said Susan Wojcicki. "I look forward to advising the Company to further scale the adoption of these solutions, to achieve their mission of making global change visible, accessible and actionable for organizations around the world, all towards the tremendous impact I know the company can have."

Planet Labs, a publicly traded company, STILL advertises Susan Wojcicki as a Director, screenshot taken August 14, 2024. This is, I am pretty sure, a violation of some SEC rule.

Was Susan uploaded to the cloud and will be attending the board meetings from there? It is a hot new satellite company after all…

I am not proposing any conspiracy theories, and not saying Wojcicki didn’t die of cancer. Simply reporting this bizarre fact for your information.

Art for today: More sketches of Foxgloves, watercolor, 9x12 in.