Tony Hsieh – CEO, Zappos, VC
Tony Hsieh (Shay) is an internet entrepreneur and venture capitalist. He is the CEO of the online shoe and clothing shop Zappos.com. Prior to joining Zappos, Hsieh co-founded and sold the internet advertising network LinkExchange to Microsoft in 1999 for $265 million.
Tony originally got involved with Zappos as an advisor and investor in 1999, about 2 months after the company was founded. Over time, Tony ended up spending more and more time with the company because it was both the most fun and the most promising out of all the companies that he was involved with. He eventually joined Zappos full time in 2000. Under his leadership, Zappos has grown gross merchandise sales from $1.6M in 2000 to over $1 billion in 2008 by focusing relentlessly on customer service. Tony focuses on continuing to grow the business at a rapid pace while maintaining the culture and feel of a small company. Prior to joining Zappos, Tony co-founded Venture Frogs with Alfred Lin. Venture Frogs is an incubator and investment firm that invested in Internet startups, including Ask Jeeves, Tellme Networks, and of course, Zappos.com. Tony met Alfred Lin (COO/CFO) in college, when Tony was running a pizza business and Alfred was his #1 customer.
