Kevin Hartz is an American businessman in the technology industry. He is the co-founder of Xoom, of which he was the CEO from 2001 to 2005.

Biography

2013 - Next13 conference 0070 (8678043070)

Hartz was born in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...

, and raised in

Orinda, California Orinda is a city in Contra Costa County, California, United States. The city's population as of the 2020 census is estimated at 19,514 residents. History Orinda is located within four Mexican land grants: Rancho Laguna de los Palos Colorados ...

. His high school was Miramonte High School, Orinda, Calif. He holds a BAS from

Stanford University 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 conside ...

in history, as well as an MA in British history from

University College In a number of countries, a university college is a college institution that provides tertiary education but does not have full or independent university status. A university college is often part of a larger university. The precise usage varies ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

Career

Hartz began his career at

Silicon Graphics Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and soft ...

(SGI) as the

product manager A product manager (PM) is a professional role that is responsible for the development of products for an organization, known as the practice of product management. Product managers own the product strategy behind a product (physical or digital), ...

for

virtual reality Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that employs pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video games), edu ...

browser Cosmo Player. Hartz was a co-founder of ConnectGroup, a start-up providing high-speed Internet access to the hotel industry. Five months after incorporating the company, it was acquired by LodgeNet (NASDAQ: LNET). In 2001, Hartz co-founded Xoom, an international money

remittance A remittance is a non-commercial transfer of money by a foreign worker, a member of a diaspora community, or a citizen with familial ties abroad, for household income in their home country or homeland. Money sent home by migrants competes wi ...

business, along with

Alan Braverman Alan Michael Braverman is an American businessman. He is co-founder and initial CTO of Xoom Corporation/Eventbrite with Kevin Hartz and Geni.com/Yammer with David O. Sacks. In 2014 Braverman worked on Sobo, "an audio version of Twitter" Bra ...

. He served as CEO until 2005 and served on the Board of Directors through its 2012 IPO and subsequent acquisition by

PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support online money transfers, and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper ...

in 2015. The company had a total equity value of $1.1 billion. Hartz founded

Eventbrite Eventbrite is an American event management and ticketing website. The service allows users to browse, create, and promote local events. The service charges a fee to event organizers in exchange for online ticketing services, unless the event is f ...

, the global self-service ticketing platform, in 2006 with Julia Hartz and Renaud Visage. Hartz joined

Founders Fund Founders Fund is a San Francisco-based venture capital firm. Formed in 2005, Founders Fund had more than $11 billion in aggregate capital under management as of 2022. The firm invests across all stages and sectors, including aerospace, artificia ...

in September 2016 and served as a partner but announced his exit from the company in June 2018. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for Eventbrite (Chairman) and Lookout.

Investments

Hartz began his early stage investing after the sale of Connect Group to LodgeNet. He took the profits from that sale and invested in a company called FieldLink, which later became

Confinity Confinity Inc. was an American software company based in Silicon Valley, best known as the creator of PayPal. It was founded in December 1998 by Max Levchin, Peter Thiel, and Luke Nosek, initially as a Palm Pilot payments and cryptography compa ...

, which then became PayPal. This early investment in PayPal influenced his later founding of Xoom and Eventbrite. His other investments include: * PayPal (Nasd: PayPal) *

Airbnb Airbnb, Inc. ( ), based in San Francisco, California, operates an online marketplace focused on short-term homestays and experiences. The company acts as a broker and charges a commission from each booking. The company was founded in 2008 b ...

(seed investor) *

Pinterest Pinterest is an American image sharing and social media service designed to enable saving and discovery of information (specifically "ideas") on the internet using images, and on a smaller scale, animated GIFs and videos, in the form of pinboard ...

(seed investor) * Milo (acquired by eBay) *

Uber Uber Technologies, Inc. (Uber), based in San Francisco, provides mobility as a service, ride-hailing (allowing users to book a car and driver to transport them in a way similar to a taxi), food delivery ( Uber Eats and Postmates), pa ...

(series B) * Lookout (seed investor) *

Flixster Flixster is an American social-networking movie website for discovering new movies, learning about movies, and meeting others with similar tastes in movies, currently owned by parent company Fandango. The formerly independent site, allows users ...

(acquired by Warner Brothers) *

Trulia Trulia is an American online real estate marketplace which is a subsidiary of Zillow. It facilitates buyers and renters to find homes and neighborhoods across the United States through recommendations, local insights, and map overlays that offer ...

(acquired by Zillow) *

TripIt SAP Concur (formerly Concur Technologies) is an American SaaS company providing travel and expense management services to businesses. It is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. SAP SE agreed to acquire Concur Technologies in September 2014 for ...

(acquired by Concur) *

Yammer Yammer () is an enterprise social networking service that is part of the Microsoft 365 family of products. It is used mainly for private communication within organizations but is also used for networks spanning various organizations. Access to ...

(acquired by Microsoft) *

Thumbtack A drawing pin (in British English) or thumb tack (in North American English) is a short nail or pin used to fasten items to a wall or board for display and intended to be inserted by hand, usually using the thumb. A variety of names is used ...

* Gusto * Joby Aviation

Personal life

Hartz lives in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " 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 fourth most populous in California and 17t ...

with his wife, Julia Hartz, and their two daughters.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hartz, Kevin American technology executives American business executives Living people People from Orinda, California Date of birth missing (living people) Year of birth missing (living people) Alumni of University College, Oxford Stanford University alumni