John W. Thompson
John W. Thompson John W. Thompson Born (1949-04-24) April 24, 1949 (age 65) Fort Dix, New Jersey, US Alma mater Florida A&M University MIT Sloan School of Management Occupation CEO of Virtual Instruments Chairman of Microsoft John Wendell Thompson (born April 24, 1949) is the CEO of privately held Virtual Instruments and the Chairman of Microsoft Corporation. He is a former vice-president at IBM and the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Symantec Corporation. Thompson later became an independent director on the board of Microsoft and on February 4, 2014 he was named the Chairman of the board. He led the search for Microsoft's next CEO; as a result, Satya Nadella was selected.