Technology >> CEO Interviews >> April 26, 1999
NAVEEN JAIN is Chairman, CEO and Founder of InfoSpace.com, Inc., the
leading provider of private label solutions for content and commerce to
portals and Internet appliances. Jain founded the company in April 1996
with the vision of delivering real world content on the Internet '
anytime, anywhere and on any device. He became interested in this field
when he noticed that the Internet failed to provide people with the
useful and relevant real world information they needed. That vision has
been core to the success of InfoSpace.com and to the overall Internet
industry as a whole. Naveen came to the United States from India in 1979
and joined Microsoft Corporation in 1989. He started out as a program
manager on OS/2 and then worked on MS-DOS, Windows NT, and Windows 95,
for which he holds two patents. He then moved on to become a group
manager and launch Microsoft's online service, The Microsoft Network.
Naveen left Microsoft in March 1996, after seven years at the company,
to start InfoSpace.com.
Before coming to the U.S., Naveen completed his education, receiving a
Bachelor of Science in Engineering from the University of Roorkee and a
Masters Degree in Business Administration from St. Xavier's School of
Management. Naveen has been married for 10 years and has three children.
Honors & Awards: Voted a finalist by Ernst & Young in the category for
'Emerging Entrepreneur' for 1998. Honored in the July 1997 issue of Red
Herring as one of 'Top 20 Entrepreneurs.' Named one of 'The most
influential people in Yellow Pages in 1997' by Directory World. Profile
TWST: Let's start out by your giving us a brief overview ofInfoSpace.com - your history, services, products, customers, those kinds
of things?, please.
Mr. Jain: InfoSpace.com provides