Susan Wojcicki, former YouTube CEO and tech pioneer, has died.

Former YouTube executive and tech pioneer Susan Wojcicki, who played a key role in Google’s rise, has died at 56 of lung cancer, her husband said Friday.

Susan Wojcicki has spent nearly two decades helping to change Google, the Internet search engine that started in her garage and became a global tech giant.

At YouTube, which was acquired by Google in 2006, Wojcicki led operations for nearly a decade before stepping down last year to focus on his personal projects, family and his health.

Her husband, Dennis Troper, wrote on Facebook that his wife had been battling lung cancer for two years.

“My beloved wife of 26 years and mother of our five children left us this Saturday,” he wrote.

“Susan was not only my best friend and life partner, but also a brilliant mind, a loving mother, and a dear friend to many. Her impact on our family and the world was immeasurable,” added Dennis Troper.

Susan Wojcicki was working at Intel when friends Sergey Brin and Larry Page founded Google in their garage in Menlo Park, California, in 1998.

A year later, she joined the company as its 16th employee and first chief marketing officer.

At Google, he helped create the company’s image search engine and worked on the acquisition of YouTube and the DoubleClick advertising platform.

“It’s hard to imagine a world without him,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai wrote.

Appointed CEO of YouTube in 2014, Susan Wojcicki introduced new forms of advertising and fueled its growth by launching a streaming TV service as viewers increasingly turn to the internet for shows and movies.

He is also known for addressing issues related to children’s privacy, hate speech and the spread of misinformation, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic.

When she was hired while four months pregnant, she advocated for paid maternity leave.