Vizu – The Internet's Premier Brand Ad Measurement System
From its roots as an online market research and opinion polling firm, Vizu developed it's Ad Catalyst service. Ad Catalyst is a digital ad effectiveness measurement system that goes beyond counting "clicks" to measure how online ads impact viewer perceptions of key brand attributes. Many of the Internet's premier publishers and leading digital ad agencies use Ad Catalyst to make sure that they deliver the most efficient, effective advertising to the brands with which they work.
Vizu is a privately held company backed by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Greycroft Partners, WR Hambrecht + Co, Amicus, LLC and leading angel investors including Ron Conway, Esther Dyson, Mike Maples, Jr., and Dave Whorton.
Executive Management
Dan Beltramo — CEO and Co-Founder
Prior to co–founding Vizu in 2005, Dan served as acting vice president of marketing at Destination–U, an online college research and matching service for students. Previously he was vice president of marketing at Instill Corporation, where he led corporate product strategy, business development, marketing communications, and public relations. Dan joined Instill from the Clorox Company where he had spent several years managing various consumer product brands representing over $500 million in sales including Armor All, Fresh Step, Hidden Valley, Jonny Cat and KC Masterpiece. Dan started his career as the founder and president of Hobson´s, an ice cream and dessert business, and subsequently served as a management consultant for the LEK Partnership, where he worked with start–up and global enterprises.
Dan graduated with an undergraduate degree in Decision Analysis from Stanford University and earned his MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Nick Rau — CTO
Nick Rau is responsible for leading product development and engineering for Vizu. He brings a wealth of experience in Web software development, data analytics, and user interface design. Previously, Nick spent seven years at Modem Media / Digitas, a leading marketing strategy and services firm serving Fortune 500 clients. He was responsible for Modem's technology practice on the West Coast. Nick served as overall account lead for a number of clients during his tenure, and provided strategic direction to his client partners as well as directly managed project teams. He has a deep understanding of application architecture, content management, user interface design, and front–end technologies, and has worked on many highly trafficked e–commerce, CRM, and rich–media Web properties.
Nick graduated with a BS in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign and received a MS in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California at Berkeley.
Bill Jaris — SVP Sales
With over 20 years of years of advertising, media and marketing experience, Bill brings a valuable mix of industry know-how to the Vizu team. After a successful career in advertising sales with Time Inc., Times-Mirror and the Hearst Corporation, Bill transitioned to interactive advertising as Executive Vice President and founding member for @plan Inc, the pioneering internet market research company that was acquired by DoubleClick. Additionally, he was Vice President and Director of Business Development at Tacoda, the behavioral targeting company acquired by AOL in 2007. Most recently, Bill was New Business Development Director at Acerno Inc, the predictive marketing and e-commerce database company.
Bill is a graduate of Holy Cross College.
Jeremy Longinotti — VP Business Development
Jeremy joined Vizu after 3 years at Yahoo! where he ran business development and revenue strategy for the Yahoo! Front Page, the Internet’s most-visited page, and My Yahoo!, the #1 personal start page on the Web. At Yahoo! he also managed strategic technology partnerships for Yahoo! Local search and Yahoo! Maps. Prior to Yahoo!, Jeremy managed Internet infrastructure portfolio company investments for Raza Foundries and Infinity Capital. As an early member of the Cisco Systems M&A team, Jeremy was involved in 15 investment and acquisition transactions that helped Cisco build its product line and technical leadership. He started his career advising financial services and manufacturing companies at Braxton Associates. Jeremy has over 10 years experience developing successful business strategies and closing a wide variety of strategic partnerships, vendor contracts, investments and acquisitions in technology and Internet companies.
Jeremy earned a bachelor’s degree in engineering sciences from Dartmouth College and holds an MBA as a Haas Merit Scholar from the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley.
Board
Ravi Belani — Associate Draper Fisher Jurvetson
Ravi Belani is an Associate and Kauffman Fellow at Draper Fisher Jurvetson. Ravi brings experiences with new ventures and established firms to his role. Prior to Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Ravi worked in product management at software startup Zaplet (acquired by MetricStream). Ravi has also worked in product management at enterprise software company Extensity (IPO’d then acquired by GEAC) as a Mayfield Fellow. As a management consultant at McKinsey and Company’s San Francisco office, Ravi worked with Fortune 500 hi tech and biotech companies on a range of strategic issues, including market attractiveness assessments, pricing, channel strategy, and new product development processes. He has also worked at Medtronic on wireless communication technologies for remote patient monitoring and in equity research at Bridgewater Associates. Ravi is a Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi graduate of Stanford University, holding a BS with Distinction and MS in Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management. Ravi also holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Dan Beltramo
(see Executive Management)
Ian Sigalow — Principal Greycroft Partners
Ian Sigalow is a Principal at Greycroft Partners and joined the fund shortly after its founding in 2006. Prior to Greycroft Ian founded and served as CEO of StrongData Corporation, a pioneer in thin-film, digital encryption. Ian also spent several years as a venture capitalist with Boston Millennia Partners, where he focused on early stage investments in the software and telecommunications industries. Ian's current investments include Collective Media, Buddy Media, Buzzd, OnePIN, Vizu, and M5 Networks. Ian's past investments included Airpath (acquired by Aptilo) and SensorLogic. Ian holds a BS in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an MBA from Columbia University Graduate School of Business.
Mack Tilling — Co-Founder
Vizu is Mack's third start–up experience. Most recently Mack founded Instill Corporation, which provides e–commerce and supply–chain management services for the food service industry. As Chairman and CEO, over the course of a decade Mack helped build Instill into the leading provider of these services to customers including Marriott, Sodexho, the purchasing divisions of Yum! Brands and Subway, as well as food manufacturers such as Procter & Gamble to Coca–Cola. Prior to Instill, Mack joined Dan Gordon and Dean Biersch when they were launching Gordon Biersch Brewing Company, and spent five years as the company´s Director of Operations, helping it on its way to become one of the most successful and acclaimed brewery restaurant chains in the country.
Mack was born and raised in Hong Kong and moved to the Bay Area to attend Stanford University, where he received a bachelor's degree in Economics. He has remained in Silicon Valley and the San Francisco area since.
Advisors
Greg Stuart
Greg Stuart is Co-Author of What Sticks and former CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the interactive advertising industry groups comprised of AOL, CNET, Google, MSN, Disney, Yahoo! & others. He led the industry from $6B in 2001 to $17B today.
He has 20+ years in Internet start-ups, digital media and traditional advertising. Greg serves on the Board of Directors for Rapt, Inc. in San Francisco, Allyes in China, and the Ad Research Foundation. He is on the Advisory Boards of Adify, Fraudwall, Tremor Media, Veoh, Vizu, ZenZui, and myYearbook -- plus non-profits SEMPO, IAB Mexico and the Advertising Research Foundation. Greg has a BA in Economics from the University of Washington and lives in Bridgehampton, NY.
Lee Smith
Lee Smith is the President & CEO of Persuasive Brands, a marketing services firm helping clients to raise awareness levels, build brands, induce trial and drive sales via the online environment. Lee is frequently quoted for his marketing and advertising expertise by The Associated Press, USA Today, MediaPost Communications, National Public Radio and other major media outlets.
Lee has 20+ years in the software industry including 15+ years in the marketing, advertising and research industries. Among leadership positions at other companies, Lee was the co-founder, President, COO and acting CEO of InsightExpress, driving this online research firm from a start-up to one of the top 50 market research companies in the United States. Lee has an MBA from Carnegie Mellon's Tepper Business School and a BS in Computer Science from The Pennsylvania State University.
Bob Jeffrey
Bob Jeffrey is CEO and Chairman of JWT, the fourth largest advertising agency in the world. Jeffrey became CEO in 2004 and added the Chairman title in 2005, overseeing a 300-plus network of offices. Prior to leading JWT, Jeffrey served as President of JWT North America and drove growth at JWT’s New York operations. Jeffrey is credited with turning JWT from a traditional advertising agency into an integrated brand communications company, testing this transformation during his stint in New York before implementing it company-wide. Jeffrey joined JWT as New York President in 1998.
Prior to this, Jeffrey served as Executive Vice President and Managing Director at Lowe & Partners, developing the ad agency’s first west coast operations. Jeffrey began his advertising career in 1982 as an account executive at DDB and Chiat/Day in New York before co-founding his own agency, Goldsmith/Jeffrey. Lowe & Partners acquired the agency in 1996. Jeffrey grew up in Providence, R.I. and currently lives in New York.
Stephen Klein
Stephen Klein has a highly successful history of building innovative technology companies. After an18 year career in the advertising and marketing industry, Stephen founded iballs, the first pure-play internet media buying company. He sold the company to Aquantive, Inc. which went public shortly after the acquisition of iballs, Stephen then ran Colloquis, Inc. a venture backed software start-up that he turned around and eventually sold to Microsoft. Previously, Stephen had an 18 year career in the advertising industry, managing media planning and buying operations as well as managing campaigns of many Internet companies (Netscape, DLJDirect, uBid) and traditional marketers (Snapple, Panasonic, Volvo, and others).
Stephen began his career at Grey Advertising in media planning, eventually holding the position of Manager of Media Research. His longest tenure in the ad industry was as a Managing Partner at Kirshenbaum Bond & Partners, arriving when the firm had 15 employees and leaving when over 400 were employed. Steve currently is the founder and CEO of Urchive LLC, a company that provides online resources to collectors (of art and collectibles) and sellers seeking to reach the collector market.
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