Anand Rajaraman is a Web and technology entrepreneur. He is the co-founder of Cambrian Ventures and

Kosmix Walmart Labs (formerly named Kosmix and @WalmartLabs) became part of Walmart Global Tech, the technology and business services organization within Walmart. Venky Harinarayan and Anand Rajaraman founded Kosmix in 2005. In April 2011, Walmart acqu ...

. Rajaraman also co-founded former Junglee Corp. and played a significant role at

Amazon.com Amazon.com, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational technology company focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It has been referred to as "one of the most influential economi ...

in the late 1990s.

Personal life and education

Rajaraman was born in

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. He has an MS and a

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

(2001) in

Computer Science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

from

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

University, under

Jeffrey Ullman Jeffrey David Ullman (born November 22, 1942) is an American computer scientist and the Stanford W. Ascherman Professor of Engineering, Emeritus, at Stanford University. His textbooks on compilers (various editions are popularly known as the dr ...

, and a Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science from

IIT Madras Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) is a public technical university located in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. As one of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), it is recognized as an Institute of National Importance and has be ...

(Class of 1989).

Career

Together with four other engineers, Rajaraman founded Junglee Corp. in 1996. Junglee Corp. pioneered Internet comparison shopping. Junglee Corp. was acquired by Amazon.com Inc. in August 1998 for 1.6 million shares of stock valued at $250 million. Rajaraman went on to become Director of Technology at Amazon.com, where he was responsible for technology strategy. He helped launch the transformation of Amazon.com from a retailer into a retail platform, enabling third-party retailers to sell on Amazon.com's website. Third-party transactions now account for almost 25% of all US transactions, and represent Amazon's fastest-growing and most profitable business segment. Rajaraman also was an inventor of the concept underlying Amazon.com’s Mechanical Turk. Rajaraman and his business partner,

Venky Harinarayan Venky Harinarayan is an Indian entrepreneur. He is the co-founder of Cambrian Ventures and Kosmix. Harinarayan also co-founded Junglee Corp. and played a significant role at Amazon.com in the late 1990s. Originally from Bombay, India, Harinara ...

, co-founded Cambrian Ventures, an early stage VC fund, in 2000. Cambrian went on to back several companies later acquired by

Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...

. Cambrian has funded companies like Mobissimo,

Aster Data Systems Aster Data Systems was a data management and analysis software company headquartered in San Carlos, California. It was founded in 2005 and acquired by Teradata in 2011. History Aster Data was co-founded in 2005 by Stanford University graduate stu ...

and TheFind.com. In April 2011, Kosmix was acquired by

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

. In addition to acting as a consulting assistant professor in the Computer Science Department at Stanford University, Rajaraman is a special partner to NeoTribe Ventures and publishes a blog called Datawocky, on which he discusses data mining techniques in

search Searching or search may refer to: Computing technology * Search algorithm, including keyword search ** :Search algorithms * Search and optimization for problem solving in artificial intelligence * Search engine technology, software for findi ...

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

, and advertising.

Personal life and education

Career

References

External links