CEOs at Yum! Brands tend to have lengthy resumes with the company. And that was the case with David Gibbs, who on Monday announced his plans to retire in early 2026.
Gibbs assumed the reins at the end of 2019, taking over for Greg Creed, who retired after 25 years with the Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and KFC owner (Habit Burger & Grill was added in March 2020). At that point, Gibbs was chief operating officer and president and a member of Yum! going back to 1989, serving in titles such as CFO, chief strategy officer, CEO of Pizza Hut Global, and CFO of Yum!’s international division.
Gibbs, who is expected to step aside in Q1 2026 and will lead Yum! to that point, with business operating as usual, will walk away with 36 years of tenure. Yum!’s Board of Directors said Monday it’s established a succession planning committee and “will work deliberately to identify and appoint the best candidate to lead the company’s next chapter.”
“I set out to strengthen and broaden the appeal of our iconic brands, build industry-leading digital capabilities, dramatically accelerate the pace of profitable new unit development, and amplify our people-first culture,” Gibbs said in a statement. “I am pleased with the progress we have made on all fronts and know that Yum! Brands is now stronger and more resilient than ever. I look forward to supporting the next CEO candidate and ensuring the company is set up for continued success. In the meantime, my focus remains on executing our strategy and delivering against our growth commitments.”
Gibbs appreciated just about two-and-a-half months atop Yum! before COVID-19 hit in force. He forfeited his base salary for the year—about $900,000 at the time—in order to fund $1,000 bonuses for the company’s then-nearly 1,200 general managers and the Yum! Brands Foundation Global Employee Medical Relief Fund. In response to Black Lives Matter, Gibbs first pledged $3 million in donations to nonprofits but later announced a “Unlocking Opportunity Initiative” that committed $100 million over five years.
MORE ON YUM!’S COVID RESPONSE HERE
Given Yum!’s massive presence in China, Gibbs had a sense of what was coming. The company called off a global franchise convention intended for 1,500 people that happens every other year. By late March 2020, roughly 7,000 global restaurants were closed, including more than 1,000 domestic Pizza Hut express and 900-plus KFCs in the U.K. Other markets, like the U.S., limited operations to drive-thru, delivery, and carryout. Yum! peaked at about 11,000 stores closed.
Yet while this pandemic stretch began with crisis navigation, Gibbs also directed transformative plans. Yum! China’s Pizza Hut business is credited with developing contactless delivery, which soon became ubiquitous industry-wide. The group rolled it first and developed protocols that spread across the Yum! system.
Gibbs at the time said “three months of COVID equaled three years” when it came to accelerating Yum!’s digital journey. Consumer adoption surged to where it would have expected it to be in 2023 or 2024 in terms of how much guests were using digital order and pay.
Yum! responded by adding resources and compressing timelines. Contactless expanded worldwide “probably in weeks” where previously it would have been more like six months. Gibbs called the model “crisis-like collaboration,” a phrase Yum! used before the pandemic but pushed into hyperdrive. “The things that we’re finding that are working now aren’t necessarily new things on our radar. They’re just more important now,” he said then.
Gibbs’ goal as CEO from the outset was to lean on customer experience. Yum! welcomes some 40 million customers a day. He also wanted to jumpstart the company’s technology blueprint and expand culture from a recognition landscape to a collaboration one.
Yum! in 2024 opened 4,535 new stores across more than 100 countries to surpass 61,000 restaurants in over 155 countries. Digital sales lifted roughly 15 percent and mix topped 50 percent. Digital system sales in Q4 exceeded $9 billion. The ambition remains to reach 100 percent digital sales.
During Gibbs’ oversight, digital sales climbed beyond $30 billion in 2024 and the pace of annual net new unit developed tripled.
In February, the company introduced Byte by Yum!, a new proprietary AI-driven platform that consolidates several essential systems into one powerful tech suite for its entire restaurant group. The platform comprises online and mobile app ordering, point of sale, kitchen and delivery optimization, menu management, inventory and labor management, and team member tools. KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and Habit Burger & Grill use elements of Byte to process more than 300 million digital transactions annually.
By the end of Q4, 25,000 restaurants worldwide began using at least one of Byte by Yum!’s products.
Yum! spent nearly 10 years, a process that began when Gibbs was CFO, creating this state-of-the-art tech suite that would ultimately allow it to control its own destiny. Gibbs in February said the largest restaurant company in the industry should have “the best technology in the world for our franchise partners at the lowest possible cost.
Yum! has acquired and developed technology capabilities over the years (i.e. Ticktuk Technologies, Dragontail Systems), but with Byte by Yum!, the company is phasing out legacy names and branding—like Poseidon, Yum! Commerce Platform, Tracks, and SuperApp—and housing it all under Byte by Yum!
More recently, in mid-March, Yum! announced a partnership with NVIDIA—a highly regarded leader in AI development—to scale AI-powered innovation. Yum! represents NVIDIA’s first AI restaurant partner. The company will integrate NVIDIA’s AI solutions into Byte by Yum!
“Along with the entire Board of Directors, I commend David for his dedication to Yum! Brands and applaud his transformative impact on the company—not just in his time as CEO, but throughout the entirety of his nearly four-decade career with Yum! Brands,” said Brian Cornell, non-executive chairman of the Yum! Brands Board and chairman and CEO of Target Corporation. “The Board is committed to overseeing a thorough succession planning process and appreciates David’s continued leadership of the business as well as the ample timeline provided to ensure a seamless leadership transition.
