Justin Yoshimura (born 1990)Zoran Basich
"500friends' Founder Has Come A Long Way From The Lemonade Stand,"
''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', March 19, 2012. is an American technology entrepreneur and investor. He is the founder, chairman, and CEO of the holding company CSC Generation.

Early life

Yoshimura was raised in

Palos Verdes Estates, California Palos Verdes Estates (''Palos Verdes'', Spanish for "Green Sticks") is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, situated on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. The city was master-planned by the noted American landscape architect and pl ...

.Jordan England-Nelson
"Palos Verdes High dropout-turned-millionaire Justin Yoshimura helps Loyola Marymount entrepreneurs,"
''

Daily Breeze The ''Daily Breeze'' is a 57,000-circulation daily newspaper published in Hermosa Beach, California Hermosa Beach (''Hermosa'', Spanish language, Spanish for "Beautiful") is a beachfront city in Los Angeles County in the U.S. state of Calif ...

'', October 20, 2014. As a student at

Palos Verdes High School Palos Verdes High School (PVHS) is one of three public high schools on the Palos Verdes Peninsula in Los Angeles County, Southern California, USA (the others being Palos Verdes Peninsula High School (formerly Rolling Hills High School) and Rancho ...

, he launched CellsWholesale.com, an online marketplace for cell phones. In its first year, the business generated $1 million in revenue, and he dropped out of high school in his junior year to run the business full-time. He sold it in 2008.

Career

In 2010, Yoshimura founded 500friends, a cloud-based platform providing loyalty and other incentive programs for

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the activity of electronically buying or selling of products on online services or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile commerce, electronic funds transfer, supply chain manageme ...

companies. It was launched in 2011, and backed by

Y Combinator Y Combinator (YC) is an American technology startup accelerator launched in March 2005. It has been used to launch more than 3,000 companies, including Airbnb, Coinbase, Cruise, DoorDash, Dropbox, Instacart, Quora, PagerDuty, Reddit, Str ...

, with Yoshimura as CEO.Sarah Perez
"500Friends Raises $4.5M Series A For Its Social Loyalty Platform,"

TechCrunch TechCrunch is an American online newspaper focusing on high tech and startup companies. It was founded in June 2005 by Archimedes Ventures, led by partners Michael Arrington and Keith Teare. In 2010, AOL acquired the company for approximately ...

, March 14, 2012. In March 2012, 500friends raised $4.5 million in Series A financing, led by

Crosslink Capital Crosslink Capital is a leading early-stage venture capital firm with an asset management business that continues into the public equity market for fast-growing companies. The firm has over $2.0B assets under management that it invests in consu ...

, with participation from

Intel Capital Intel Capital is a division of Intel Corporation, set up to manage corporate venture capital, global investment, mergers and acquisitions. Intel Capital makes equity investments in a range of technology startups and companies offering hardware, so ...

, with Yoshimura becoming the youngest entrepreneur Crosslink and Intel had backed at the time. In March 2013, 500friends raised $5 million in Series B financing, led by Intel Capital and Fung Capital, bringing its total funding to $12 million. 500friends was acquired by data marketing firm Merkle Inc. in November 2014, and Yoshimura was named Merkle's senior vice president of loyalty.Tomio Geron
"CSC Generation Turns Ecommerce Sites into Product Leasing,"
''Wall Street Journal'', June 15, 2017. In 2014, Yoshimura founded CSC Generation, and purchased the domain name Ice.com, converting it into an online jewelry marketplace. He then acquired several other e-commerce marketplaces, including

DirectBuy DirectBuy is an American membership buying service headquartered in Merrillville, Indiana. Members pay a fee, which entitles them to buy products at a discount, directly from the manufacturer and its authorized suppliers. Product categories inclu ...

, in February 2017. In 2017, CSC Generation generated $150 million in sales. CSC is backed by Chinese private equity firm China Science & Merchants Capital Management and

Khosla Ventures Khosla Ventures is an American venture capital firm founded by Vinod Khosla, focused on early-stage companies in the Internet, computing, mobile, financial services, agriculture, healthcare and clean technology sectors. Some of its most successfu ...

. Yoshimura also invests in early stage startups, including the media company MACRO, and technology companies Zencoder,Tomio Geron
"500Friends Raises $4.5 Million Series A For Social Loyalty,"
''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...

'', March 15, 2012. Hipmunk, and Bounce Exchange. In 2011, he was named to the ''

'' 30 Under 30 in the Social/Mobile category.Elizabeth Woyke
"30 Under 30: Social/Mobile,"
''Forbes'', December 19, 2011.

References

External links

Justin Yoshimura
at

Bloomberg.com Bloomberg News (originally Bloomberg Business News) is an international news agency headquartered in New York City and a division of Bloomberg L.P. Content produced by Bloomberg News is disseminated through Bloomberg Terminals, Bloomberg Televi ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yoshimura, Justin Living people 1990 births People from Torrance, California People from Palos Verdes Estates, California Businesspeople from Los Angeles Businesspeople from Chicago American technology chief executives American investors