Fred Bradley Hunstable (born 1978) is an American businessman and the co-founder and CEO of the electric motor company
Linear Labs.
Linear Labs was founded by Hunstable in 2014 with his father, Fred Hunstable. Brad is also the co-founder and former CEO of
UStream
IBM Watson Media (formerly Ustream and IBM Cloud Video) is an American virtual events platform company which is a division of IBM. Prior to IBM acquisition, it had more than 180 employees across San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Budapest offices. ...
which was sold to
IBM in 2016 for $150 million.
Hunstable was formerly the founder and CEO of
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
,
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
-based live streaming website
Ustream.tv, one of the largest consumer live video sites on the Internet. In 2014, he was honored as one of the SF Business Times "40 Under 40" for the most influential young leaders across the spectrum of
Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Gov ...
businesses. In 2016, Ustream was acquired by
IBM for a reported $150 million.
Ranked among 50 "Digital Power Players" by ''
The Hollywood Reporter
''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...
'' in 2010, Hunstable was announced on
Variety
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
Producers Guild of America's 2010 Digital 25: Visionaries, Innovators and Producers list for his work at Ustream.
Ustream was selected as a ''
PC Magazine
''PC Magazine'' (shortened as ''PCMag'') is an American computer magazine published by Ziff Davis. A print edition was published from 1982 to January 2009. Publication of online editions started in late 1994 and have continued to the present d ...
'' Editor's Choice. Notable investors include
Softbank
is a Japanese multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo which focuses on investment management. The Group primarily invests in companies operating in technology, energy, and financial sectors. It also runs the ...
,
DCM,
Frank J. Caufield, and the
Band Of Angels
''Band of Angels'' is a 1957 psychological drama film set in the American South before and during the American Civil War, based on the 1955 novel of the same name by Robert Penn Warren. It starred Clark Gable, Yvonne De Carlo and Sidney Poitier ...
.
[UStream.TV Gets Some Cash And General Wesley Clark](_blank)
/ref> General Wesley Clark
Wesley Kanne Clark (born December 23, 1944) is a retired United States Army officer. He graduated as valedictorian of the class of 1966 at West Point and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford, where he obtained a degree ...
serves Ustream.TV's board of advisors.
Hunstable is the father of three children. One of them, Hayden, died on April 17, 2020 after committing suicide. The Hunstable family set up the charity Hayden’s Corner, in his honour.
Biography
Early life
Fred Bradley Hunstable was born on September 26, 1978 in Tarrant County, Texas
Tarrant County is located in the U.S. state of Texas. As of 2020, it had a population of 2,110,640. It is Texas' third-most populous county and the 15th-most populous in the United States. Its county seat is Fort Worth. Tarrant County, one of 2 ...
, and grew up in Granbury, Texas
Granbury is a city in and the county seat of Hood County, Texas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city's population was 10,958, and it is the principal city of the Granbury micropolitan statistical area. Granbury is named after Confede ...
, with a younger sister (Ashlee) and a younger brother (Nathan). His parents are Fred Eugene Hunstable, an electrical engineer
Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...
, and Candace "Candy" Lee Cotter, a school teacher
A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching.
''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...
. Since childhood, he has shown an interest in technology. At age 11, he started a small bulletin board system
A bulletin board system (BBS), also called computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user can perform functions such as ...
called the Dark Realms with cosysop James Gollehon.
Education
Hunstable graduated from Granbury High School
Granbury High School is a public high school located in the city of Granbury, Texas, United States and classified as a 5A school by the University Interscholastic League (UIL). It is part of the Granbury Independent School District which serves s ...
in Granbury, Texas
Granbury is a city in and the county seat of Hood County, Texas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city's population was 10,958, and it is the principal city of the Granbury micropolitan statistical area. Granbury is named after Confede ...
in 1997. He went on to receive his Bachelor of Science
A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years.
The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...
degree in engineering management
Engineering management is the application of the practice of management to the practice of engineering.
Engineering management is a career that brings together the technological problem-solving ability of engineering and the organizational, admini ...
from the United States Military Academy
The United States Military Academy (USMA), also known metonymically as West Point or simply as Army, is a United States service academy in West Point, New York. It was originally established as a fort, since it sits on strategic high groun ...
in 2001. Upon graduation, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant
Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces, comparable to NATO OF-1 rank.
Australia
The rank of second lieutenant existed in the military forces of the Australian colonies and Australian Army until ...
in the U.S. Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...
, working primarily as an operations officer. Later, through the Army, Hunstable attended the Ohio State University
The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...
's Fisher College of Business
The Max M. Fisher College of Business is the business school of The Ohio State University, a public research university in Columbus, Ohio. Fisher's campus is located on the northern part of the university within a partially enclosed business ca ...
where he received his Master of Business Administration
A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...
degree in finance
Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of fina ...
and real estate
Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more general ...
in 2005.
After West Point
Hunstable was required to serve five years in the U.S. Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...
. He served in various capacities around the world working jobs both for the Army and the Department of Defense Department of Defence or Department of Defense may refer to:
Current departments of defence
* Department of Defence (Australia)
* Department of National Defence (Canada)
* Department of Defence (Ireland)
* Department of National Defense (Philipp ...
directly.
In 2005, he left the military to work for Hillwood Development, a real estate company owned by Ross Perot
Henry Ross Perot (; June 27, 1930 – July 9, 2019) was an American business magnate, billionaire, politician and philanthropist. He was the founder and chief executive officer of Electronic Data Systems and Perot Systems. He ran an inde ...
developing master planned communities in Dallas
Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
/Fort Worth
Fort Worth is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Texas and the 13th-largest city in the United States. It is the county seat of Tarrant County, covering nearly into four other counties: Denton, Johnson, Parker, and Wise. According ...
.[
]
Ustream
Ustream was born when the founders ( John Ham, Brad Hunstable, and Dr. Gyula Feher) wanted a way for their friends in the Army, who were deployed overseas in Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...
during the war, to be able to communicate with their families back home. A product like Ustream would provide them with a way to talk to all of their relatives at once when free time in the war zone was limited.
Previously, these three had worked together on an internet based event photo sharing website using technology created by Dr. Feher. In 2003, both Brad and John Ham were deployed to active duty, putting an end to this venture. After returning to civilian life, Brad and John discussed the idea of the general public using the Internet to share live video. Seeing this as a viable product, they contacted their former partner, Dr. Feher, to develop the technology required. Ustream.tv was founded in 2006, as experiments in broadcasting Brad's brother Nathan's band
Venture
proved successful. Early testing involved Brad in the audience with a camera wired to a laptop (with a cellular card) in his backpack, sending the stream back to their test server.
Launching their public beta in March 2007, Ustream.tv was the first of a series of live video sites include Justin.tv
Justin.tv was a website created by Justin Kan, Emmett Shear, Michael Seibel, and Kyle Vogt in 2007 to allow anyone to broadcast video online. Justin.tv user accounts were called "channels", like those on YouTube, and users were encouraged to br ...
and Operator11.com. The company has seen "growth" in the political, entertainment, and technology fields.
Ustream.tv have hosted streamings from politicians Hillary Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States sen ...
, Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
, and John Edwards
Johnny Reid Edwards (born June 10, 1953) is an American lawyer and former politician who served as a U.S. senator from North Carolina. He was the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2004 alongside John Kerry, losing to incumbents George ...
and artists Tori Amos
Tori Amos (born Myra Ellen Amos; August 22, 1963) is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. She is a classically trained musician with a mezzo-soprano vocal range. Having already begun composing instrumental pieces on piano, Amos won a full ...
and the Plain White T's
Plain White T's are an American Rock music, rock band from Lombard, Illinois, formed in 1997 by high school friends Tom Higgenson, Dave Tirio, and Ken Fletcher, and joined a short time later by Steve Mast. The group had a mostly underground music, ...
. The technology community has also adopted Ustream to include Robert Scoble
Robert Scoble (born January 18, 1965) is an American blogger, technical evangelist, and author. Scoble is best known for his blog, ''Scobleizer'', which came to prominence during his tenure as a technology evangelist at Microsoft. He later worked ...
, Leo Laporte
Leo Laporte (; born November 29, 1956) is the host of ''The Tech Guy'' weekly radio show and a host on TWiT.tv, an Internet podcast network focusing on technology. He is also a former TechTV technology host (1998–2008) and a technology author. O ...
, Chris Pirillo
Chris Pirillo is an American entrepreneur and former television personality. He is the founder and former CEO of LockerGnome, Inc., a now-defunct network of blogs, web forums, mailing lists, and online communities which are now closed. He is b ...
, Scott Liberto and Cali Lewis.
Ustream.tv has raised over $60 million in funding, most recently from Softbank
is a Japanese multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo which focuses on investment management. The Group primarily invests in companies operating in technology, energy, and financial sectors. It also runs the ...
.
Personal life
Hunstable is married to April Hunstable and they have three children together.
He has two siblings, Nathan Hunstable and Ashlee Smith.
Hunstable's son, Hayden, died from suicide on April 17, 2020.
The Hunstables started the non-profit, Hayden's Corner, to promote parents starting conversations with their children to help prevent childhood suicide, the #3 cause of death in 10-14 year olds.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hunstable, Brad
American computer businesspeople
United States Military Academy alumni
People from Tarrant County, Texas
1978 births
Living people
People from Granbury, Texas
Ohio State University Fisher College of Business alumni
Military personnel from Texas