Howard D. Schultz (born July 19, 1953) is an American businessman and author who served as both chairman and CEO of Starbucks from 1986 to 2000, from 2008 to 2017, and as interim CEO since 2022. Schultz also owned the Seattle SuperSonics basketball team from 2001 to 2006. On March 16, 2022 Starbucks announced that the current CEO Kevin Johnson is retiring and that Howard Schultz would take over as interim CEO. He will serve as interim CEO until Laxman Narasimhan takes over as CEO in April 2023.