Scott David Cook (born 1952) is an American billionaire businessman who co-founded

Intuit Intuit Inc. is an American business software company that specializes in financial software. The company is headquartered in Mountain View, California, and the CEO is Sasan Goodarzi. Intuit's products include the tax preparation application ...

. Cook is also a director of

eBay eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became ...

and

Procter & Gamble The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) is an American multinational consumer goods corporation headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, founded in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble. It specializes in a wide range of personal health/consumer he ...

Early life

Cook holds a bachelor's degree in economics and mathematics from the

University of Southern California , mottoeng = "Let whoever earns the palm bear it" , religious_affiliation = Nonsectarian—historically Methodist , established = , accreditation = WSCUC , type = Private research university , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $8.1 ...

and an MBA from Harvard Business School, where he serves on the dean's advisory board.

Career

Cook started his career at Procter & Gamble in

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

, Ohio, where he learned about product development, market research, and marketing. He then took a job in strategic consulting at

Bain & Company Bain & Company is an American management consulting company headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. The firm provides advice to public, private, and non-profit organizations. One of the Big Three management consultancies, Bain & Company was fou ...

Menlo Park, California Menlo Park is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County within the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, Palo Alto, and Stanford to the south ...

. Cook soon began using the insights he was learning there to look for an idea for a company of his own. That idea came to him one day when his wife was complaining about paying the bills. With personal computers just coming out at the time, Scott thought there might be a market for basic software that would help people pay their bills. He launched

Quicken Quicken is a personal finance management application originally developed and offered by Intuit, Inc. Intuit sold Quicken to H.I.G. Capital in 2016, and H.I.G. sold Quicken to Aquiline Capital Partners in 2021. Quicken runs on Windows and Mac ...

and named his company

in 1983, which today offers software and online products to help individuals and small companies manage their finances. He was Intuit's chairman from February 1993 to July 1998. From April 1983 to April 1994, he served as president and CEO of Intuit. In 2002, Cook and his wife, Signe Ostby, established the Center for Brand and Product Management at the University of Wisconsin–Madison School of Business, the nation's first university-based center focused exclusively on training MBAs in brand and product management. Cook and Ostby both started their careers in brand management. In 2005, Cook was No. 320 on the ''

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 r ...

'' 400, with a net worth of $1.1 billion. Since the 1990s, he has "more than doubled his donations to Republicans and Democrats, giving the maximum

n 2007 N, or n, is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''en'' (pronounced ), plural ''ens''. History ...

to mainstream politicians such as Mitt Romney and

Harry Reid Harry Mason Reid Jr. (; December 2, 1939 – December 28, 2021) was an American lawyer and politician who served as a United States senator from Nevada from 1987 to 2017. He led the Senate Democratic Caucus from 2005 to 2017 and was the Sena ...

Personal life

Cook is married to Signe Ostby. Ostby worked for

and

Clorox The Clorox Company (formerly Clorox Chemical Company) is an American global manufacturer and marketer of consumer and professional products. As of 2020 the Oakland, California based company had approximately 8,800 employees worldwide. Net sales ...

before she launched

Software Publishing Corporation Software Publishing Corporation (SPC) was a Mountain View, California, Mountain View, California-based manufacturer of business software, originally well known for its "pfs:" series (and its subsequent "pfs:First" and "pfs:Professional" derivative ...

, making productivity software for personal computers. They have three children and live in

Woodside, California Woodside is a small incorporated town in San Mateo County, California, United States, on the San Francisco Peninsula. Woodside is among the wealthiest communities in the United States, home to many technology billionaires and investment manager ...

. Scott and Signe founded and are trustees of their $348 million family foundation, Valhalla, which funds early childhood development, K12 education, medical research and talent, environmental innovation,

data literacy Data literacy is the ability to read, understand, create, and communicate data as information. Much like literacy as a general concept, data literacy focuses on the Skill, competencies involved in working with data. It is, however, not similar to t ...

, and collaborative philanthropy. The Cook family owns and manages a ranch that both raises livestock for local restaurant trade, and breeds, raises, sells, and trains show jumping horses from stallions and mares chosen from European bloodlines.

References

External links

Inc. profile for article on 25 Most Fascinating Entrepreneurs

The Contribution Revolution
is the wiki companion site to Cook's recen
Harvard Business Review article
of the same name {{DEFAULTSORT:Cook, Scott 1952 births Living people University of Southern California alumni Harvard Business School alumni Procter & Gamble people Intuit people Place of birth missing (living people) American technology company founders American billionaires American corporate directors People from Woodside, California Giving Pledgers 21st-century philanthropists