Around 1,700 people gathered at the Stanford Memorial Auditorium on Tuesday to say goodbye to Dave Goldberg, who died on Friday while vacationing in Mexico.
Among those paying tribute to the SurveyMonkey CEO and husband of Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg were Mark Zuckerberg, George Lucas, Ben Affleck, John Doerr of the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, according to The New York Times.
Bono performed a special rendition of “One” to a simple accompaniment, as friends and colleagues recalled the humble, giving, intelligent and fun-loving man.
“Today we will put the love of my life to rest, but only his body,” Sandberg told those assembled at the auditorium. “His spirit and soul are still with us.”
Others noted his sense of humor and love of poker.
“We went to Vegas almost 35 times,” energy investor Phil Deutch said. “The real number is 47. One year was on a Mother’s Day — in hindsight, that was a mistake.”
Goldberg, 47, died of head trauma and blood loss after apparently falling off the treadmill at a villa in Punta Mita, according to a spokesperson for the prosecutor’s office in Nayarit State. The incident is thought to be an accident, as it appears that “he fell off the treadmill and cracked his head open,” the spokesperson said.
President Obama paid a personal tribute to Goldberg in a message on the White House Facebook page: “David Goldberg embodied the definition of a real leader — someone who was always looking for ways to empower others. He was generous and kind with everybody, and cared less about the limelight than making sure that the people he worked with and loved succeeded in whatever they did,” Obama wrote.
Under Goldberg’s leadership, SurveyMonkey went from a business that employed 12 people to now employing 500. The company has approximately 25 million customers and creates 90 million surveys a month. According to the company’s website, 99 percent of all Fortune 500 companies use their online survey tools.
Goldberg joined SurveyMonkey in 2009 after serving as vice president and general manager of Yahoo Music. He joined Yahoo after the company bought one of his earliest business ventures, LAUNCH Media, in 2001. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and government.