GitHub CEO Thomas Dohmke has stepped down to found a new company with the coding platform set to be integrated further into parent company Microsoft.
Dohmke will not be replaced with GitHub’s leaders instead reporting to Microsoft, which acquired GitHub for US$7.5 billion (A$11.5 billion) in 2018.
“My startup roots have begun tugging on me and I’ve decided to leave GitHub to become a founder again,” wrote Dohmke.
“GitHub has never been stronger than it is today. We have seen more open-source projects with more contributions every year. AI projects have doubled in the last year alone. And our presence in companies of any size is unmatched in the market.”
Dohmke did not provide details on his next company but he will depart at the end of 2025 after four years in the role.
With Dohmke’s departure, Microsoft’s developer division head Julia Liuson will oversee GitHub’s revenue, engineering, and support.
While GitHub is part of Microsoft’s CoreAI division, it has largely operated independently since its acquisition. CoreAI was launched in January 2025, and maintains Microsoft artificial intelligence (AI) products like Copilot.
GitHub’s Copilot coding assistant uses AI to suggest or write code. Similar products like Anysphere’s Cursor and Windsurf have also found success in recent years, while companies like OpenAI also offer coding features through chatbots.
GitHub has over 150 million registered developers, according to Dohmke.
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