John’s illustrious career has taken him down many interesting paths. He is currently the Chairman of Microsoft, where he has guided the company through a CEO transition and helped them navigate the IT shift to the cloud. Most recently, John served as chief executive officer of Virtual Instruments, a privately held company. Before this, he was the chief executive officer of Symantec for 10 years. Thompson also held several leadership positions during his 28 years at IBM. In 2018, he became a partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners. Since 2009, Thompson has been an active investor in early-stage technology companies in the Silicon Valley. He currently serves as either an advisor or board member with Illumina, Rubrik and Illumio.  Thompson received a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Florida A&M University, and a master’s degree in management science from MIT’s Sloan School of Management. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate degree from the University of Notre Dame, Mendoza College of Business, and in 2014 he received an honorary doctorate degree from Florida A&M University.