Twitter’s China director Kathy Chen departs after 8 months

Twitter’s seemingly endless line of executive departures continues as the company’s managing director in China, Kathy Chen, announced her departure. Though she said it was the “right time” for her to move on, she had only joined Twitter in April. Chen did not disclose her future plans, except to say in a tweet that she will “take some time off to recharge, study about different cultures and then pursue more international business opportunities.”

7/12 Now that the Twitter APAC team is working directly with Chinese advertisers, this is the right time for me to leave the company.

— Kathy Chen (@kathychen2016) December 31, 2016

Although she received the title of managing director for Greater China, Twitter wasn’t able to legally operate in the country because of a ban imposed by the government — although some users have found workarounds. The company nevertheless opened up a Hong Kong office in 2015 to pursue Chinese advertisers, with the idea that limits on using the service internally shouldn’t stop businesses from advertising beyond China’s borders.

Chen was brought on board to oversee this effort and to find ways for developers and other businesses in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan to be able to use the platform. However, Twitter faced criticism over the decision to hire her from free speech activists concerned about Chen’s background working with the People’s Liberation Army as an engineer and as CEO of Computer Associates, which once counted China’s government as a minority owner.

In a 12-part series of tweets yesterday, Chen said she felt that since Twitter now has an established relationship with Chinese advertisers, her job was done. “Great China is one of our fastest growing revenue markets in Asia Pacific for Twitter today…” she said, adding that the advertiser base has grown “nearly 400 percent over the past 2 years.”

The Hong Kong office will remain open “at this time.” Twitter also has an office in Singapore, where its Asia Pacific headquarters is located.

6/12 At this time, our HK office will stay open to maintain our Greater China presence & for business opportunities with Chinese companies.

— Kathy Chen (@kathychen2016) December 31, 2016

Chen joins a growing cadre of executives who have left the company, including chief technology officer Adam Messinger; Josh McFarland who is now a venture capitalist with Greylock; Kevin Weil who joined Instagram; chief operating officer Adam Bain; engineering executive Alex Roetter; global media head Katie Stanton; and human resources chief Brian “Skip” Schipper.