OnlyFans CEO Ami Gan steps down
After about two and a half years as CEO, Ami Gan is leaving OnlyFans. Chief strategy and operations officer Keily Blair will take over as CEO.
“Spending nearly 3 years at OnlyFans while it echoed throughout the cultural zeitgeist, has been beyond rewarding,” Gan wrote in a Twitter thread.
OnlyFans is perhaps the best-known creator platform that supports adult content, and according to Gan, the company paid out $10 billion to creators while she was CEO; PitchBook also estimated that OnlyFans would make $2.5 billion in revenue in 2022 (the company keeps 20% of payments to creators).
Despite OnlyFans’ resounding success, being CEO of the platform is a particularly difficult job. As changing credit card company policies and global legislation make it more and more difficult for online sex workers to make a living, OnlyFans must contend with these same obstacles. Shortly before Gan took over as CEO, OnlyFans infamously announced that it would ban sexually explicit content, sending its community of creators into an uproar. Though this decision was eventually reversed, creators won’t soon forget that moment of crisis, when it seemed that they were doomed to once again suffer the financial consequences of being deplatformed.
When asked at TechCrunch Disrupt whether or not adult creators can expect to still be on OnlyFans in five years, Gan said yes. However, both Gan and Blair ducked questions about how much of OnlyFans’ revenue is driven by adult creators, as the company has continuously pushed its safe-for-work offerings like OFTV.
As she announces her departure from OnlyFans, Gan has also revealed her next venture. She has founded Hoxton Projects, a marketing company that “reimagines the agency paradigm” to support founders’ business growth. Despite her tenure as a CEO, Gan’s background is in marketing; she was previously the chief marketing officer of OnlyFans, and before that, she led communications efforts at Cannabis Cafe, Red Bull, Quest Nutrition and other companies.
Blair, the new CEO, came to OnlyFans after a career in data privacy law, a skillset that serves useful at a company that cannot succeed without making users feel confident that their data is safe. Matt Reeder, the company’s deputy general counsel, will replace Blair as CSOO, and Sue Beeby will become OnlyFans’ chief communications officer.
