Bob Lee, the financial technology pioneer who created the mobile payments platform Cash App, was stabbed to death on Tuesday in San Francisco, his family said. He was 43.
San Francisco police reported this statement Officers were called to a stabbing at around 2.35am in the city centre, where they found a 43-year-old man suffering from stab wounds.
He was subsequently transported to a local hospital but died from his injuries.
“No arrests have been made and the investigation is ongoing,” police said.
Police have not released the victim's name, but his family identified him in statements on Facebook.
“I Just Lost My Best Friend” by Rick Lee wrote about your son.
“Bobby worked harder than anyone and was the smartest man I ever knew. He will be missed by everyone who knew him,” he added.
“I am so sad and disappointed by the loss of my brother,” Tim Oliver Lee. wrote. “He truly was the best of us. I was so lucky to grow up with him and I feel like I've lost a part of myself.”
Joshua Goldbard, CEO of payments company MobileCoin, where Lee worked as chief product officer, also confirmed to BuzzFeed News that Lee had died.
“Our dear friend and colleague Bob Lee passed away yesterday at the age of 43, leaving behind a loving family and many close friends and collaborators,” Goldbard said in a statement.
“Bob was a dynamo, a force of nature. Bob was a true work of art,” he added. “He was made for the world that is being born right now, he was a dream child, and everything he imagined, no matter how crazy, he brought to life.”
Lee started working joined Google in 2004 as a staff software engineer and soon began working on the development of the Android mobile operating system.
In 2010, Lee began working as the first chief technology officer at Square, the e-commerce company created by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey and now known as Block.
It was there that Lee created what is now known as Cash App, which allows users in the US and UK to send money to each other through their mobile phones.
IN podcast interviewLee said he created the service as a side project because he was frustrated with how difficult it was to get money from PayPal and because he believed there was a market for peer-to-peer payments.
As a father, he said he would also like to be able to pay his children's nanny without having to stop at an ATM to get cash.
“It was a lot of fun. It was a great learning experience, and it was interesting to look at a situation with fresh eyes and question the assumptions that other people had made,” Lee said.
“The best ideas aren't obvious until they are, and then they become very obvious,” he said.
Lee later joined MobileCoin, first as an investor and advisor and then as the company's chief product officer.
“Bob has undoubtedly made an impact that will last well beyond his short time on earth,” Goldbard said. “That may sound impressive, but Bob's real resume is the hearts and minds he touched during his time on earth. Bob's legacy is the feeling that you can make a difference if you try, and of course his wonderful children.”
