Jeff Binder is an American entrepreneur and the builder of several startups in the technology, media, and telecommunications sectors. He is the former executive vice president of home and entertainment at T-Mobile after the company bought Layer3 TV, the company Binder co-founded and served as the CEO of until the purchase for $325 million. Layer3's service and platform eventually became T-Mobile's "T-Vision" once its version was launched by the company. Jeff Binder was also the founding CEO of Broadbus Technologies and an early investor and chairman of This Technology, which were sold respectively to Motorola and Comcast. He is brothers with renowned television producer,

Steven D. Binder Steven D. Binder (born July 23, 1971) is an American screenwriter and film and television producer. He currently works on ''NCIS'' as a writer, executive producer, and showrunner. In addition, he is featured in the documentary, ''Journey to the Fl ...

Early life

Binder began playing

table tennis Table tennis, also known as ping-pong and whiff-whaff, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight ball, also known as the ping-pong ball, back and forth across a table using small solid rackets. It takes place on a hard table div ...

at 10, and was ranked in the national Top 5 during his teen years.

Career

In the 1990s, Binder's father created a company, Magic Music, which used

digital storage Data storage is the recording (storing) of information (data) in a storage medium. Handwriting, phonographic recording, magnetic tape, and optical discs are all examples of storage media. Biological molecules such as RNA and DNA are conside ...

in the mass-production of

cassette tape The Compact Cassette or Musicassette (MC), also commonly called the tape cassette, cassette tape, audio cassette, or simply tape or cassette, is an analog magnetic tape recording format for audio recording and playback. Invented by Lou Ottens ...

s. Jeff credits his father and grandfather for infusing his early years with "out-of-the-box" ideas that are key to his success in entrepreneurship today. Prior to his work in the media and telecommunications sectors, Binder was CEO of Leading Golf Courses of America, a nationwide golf membership program that included some of the top golf courses in America.

Jack Nicklaus Jack William Nicklaus (born January 21, 1940), nicknamed The Golden Bear, is a retired American professional golfer and List of golf courses designed by Jack Nicklaus, golf course designer. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest go ...

became a partner. In 1999, Binder and Robert Scheffler started Broadbus Technologies, which used digital storage, but was created instead for

video-on-demand Video on demand (VOD) is a media distribution system that allows users to access videos without a traditional video playback device and the constraints of a typical static broadcasting schedule. In the 20th century, broadcasting in the form of o ...

entertainment experiences. The company was sold to

Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent p ...

in 2006 for an estimated $186 million. In 2008, Binder joined Dave Fellows, former CTO of Comcast and AT&T Broadband, along with Broadbus executive Vin Bisceglia, to launch Genovation Capital, an early stage venture firm focused on the media space. Binder invested in This Technology a video-on-demand advertising company, and joined as its Chairman, in 2012. In 2015, the company was sold to

Comcast Corp Comcast Corporation (formerly known as American Cable Systems and Comcast Holdings),Before the AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corpora ...

., after raising more than $7 million from General Catalyst and other investors, because it had become an integral part of their platform, according to the CTO of Comcast. Binder and Fellows founded Layer3 TV in Boston in 2013. In 2014 the company opened a new headquarters in

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

. Under Binder's leadership, the company raised more than $80 Million and was named a Forbes Hottest Startup in 2015 with a valuation of $385 Million.

T-Mobile T-Mobile is the brand name used by some of the mobile communications subsidiaries of the German telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom AG in the Czech Republic (T-Mobile Czech Republic), Poland (T-Mobile Polska), the United States (T-Mobile ...

purchased Layer3 TV in 2018 and Binder became an Executive Vice President and member of the Senior Leadership Team and also led T-Mobile’s TV team. Binder left his positions at T-Mobile a year later in 2019.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Binder, Jeff Businesspeople from Chicago American technology chief executives Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Harvard University alumni