Digital
Wikimedia Foundation taps Bernadette Meehan as its new chief executive
SAN FRANCISCO: Bernadette Meehan will take the helm of the Wikimedia Foundation on January 20th 2026, stepping in as chief executive to steer the world’s largest free-knowledge movement through an era of rising regulatory scrutiny and fast-moving AI disruption. The Foundation announced the appointment on December 9th, pitching Meehan as a leader with the global instincts and political dexterity needed for Wikimedia’s next chapter.
Chair of the board of trustees Lorenzo Losa said Meehan’s collaborative, diplomacy-driven approach made her the right steward for a movement built on volunteer energy and global participation.
Meehan arrives with heavyweight foreign-policy credentials. She served as US ambassador to Chile from 2022 to 2025, leading a string of diplomatic wins—from passage of a bilateral tax treaty to a major subsea-cable project linking South America with Asia. Before that she was executive vice-president for global programmes at the Obama Foundation, crafting leadership networks across Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, Latin America and South Asia.
Her decade-plus career as a US foreign service officer included stints as special assistant to the president, spokesperson for the National Security Council, and postings in Colombia, Iraq and the UAE. Earlier, she cut her teeth in finance at J.P. Morgan Chase and Lehman Brothers.
Meehan said she was “thrilled” to join as Wikimedia marks 25 years of collaborative knowledge-building, adding that Wikimedia’s mission sits at the heart of more resilient, informed societies.
As chief executive, she will oversee global staff and work closely with thousands of volunteer editors and affiliates. Her priorities include product and technology upgrades, navigating AI-content challenges, strengthening ties with global communities and shoring up the Foundation’s financial resilience.
Meehan succeeds Maryana Iskander as Wikimedia’s sixth chief executive—and steps into the role just as the world’s most-used reference site gears up for its next quarter-century of keeping knowledge open, human and gloriously unruly.
Digital
OpenAI’s Stargate lead Peter Hoeschele exits with two senior leaders
Trio behind compute push set to join new startup amid leadership reshuffle
SAN FRANCISCO: Peter Hoeschele, a key figure behind OpenAI’s early Stargate data centre initiative, has exited the company, according to a report by The Information.
The departure is part of a broader leadership shift, with two other senior executives, Shamez Hemani and Anuj Saharan, also set to leave in the coming days. All three are expected to join the same new startup, although details about the venture remain under wraps.
The trio played a central role in OpenAI’s Stargate effort, an initiative aimed at building large-scale data centre capacity in-house to reduce reliance on external infrastructure providers. Their exits mark a notable moment for the company’s compute strategy as it continues to scale rapidly.
OpenAI spokesperson said in a statement to The Information, “We’re grateful for the contributions Peter, Shamez, and Anuj have made to OpenAI and wish them the very best in what comes next.” The company also pointed to the recent appointment of Sachin Katti to lead its industrial compute organisation, signalling continuity in its infrastructure roadmap.
OpenAI has indicated that it does not plan to directly replace Hoeschele’s role, suggesting a possible restructuring of responsibilities within the team.
As competition intensifies in the race to build next-generation AI systems, leadership changes in core infrastructure teams are likely to draw close attention. For now, the spotlight shifts to what this departing trio builds next, and how OpenAI adapts as it scales its ambitions.
