Vizu is where you come to find out what the world thinks.
Vizu provides services that make online opinion polling and market research easy, fast, accessible, and affordable to everyone. The company’s premiere service, Vizu Answers, combines an innovative market research technology with a vast network of relevant Web sites, offering highly targeted audiences to answer a wide variety of questions. Targeted responses are returned to the user within hours of creating and launching their poll. Vizu Answers’ clients have included entrepreneurial smaller firms and individuals, as well as larger consumer-oriented companies. Vizu also provides demographic characterization and enterprise polling functionality for Web sites of any size or scale.
Vizu is a privately held company backed by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, 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 product development and engineering for the company. Prior to joining Vizu, Nick spent seven years at Modem Media / Digitas, a leading marketing strategy and services firm serving Fortune 500 clients. He was responsible for leading technology on the West Coast for Modem Media, where he managed a team that provided software development services for Web systems. Nick served as account lead for a number of clients during his tenure, and provided strategic direction to his client partners and 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.
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)
Alan Katz – CTO / Managing Director WR Hambrecht + Co
Alan is CTO and Managing Director at WR Hambrecht + Co and is also a managing partner of the WR Hambrecht Ventures I LLC. Before joining WR Hambrecht + Co, Alan worked for Texas Instruments in Dallas in various capacities, including TI Ventures and as an R&D manager and individual contributor. Alan earned his PhD at Stanford University and a BA from the University of Chicago.
Mack Tilling – Founder and Chairman
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.
