Famous American IT & Software Entrepreneurs
If you are daring, resourceful, ingenious, confident, and have a penchant for all things novel and technical, then congratulations — you have all that it takes to be the next Bill Gates (Microsoft) or Michael Dell (Dell) or Larry Ellison (Oracle). That is right! These most successful and enterprising impresarios of today hit gold by revamping start-up companies into international IT powerhouses. No wonder, they are idolized as true heroes and are an inspiration to many. Agreed, these outrageously wealthy, self-made, go-getter entrepreneurs did not come out of the same blueprint. But thanks to their innovation, dedication and never-say-never attitude, today they take up a coveted place among the world achievers. These are the Americans entrepreneurs who believed that everything is possible once you set your heart to it and never took "no" for an answer. And while there is no foolproof guide to become a successful software entrepreneur like them, trailing the timeline, trivia and interesting facts on America's famous IT & software entrepreneurs in the biographies below might fire up your ambition to some extent.
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Birthdate: August 11, 1950
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: San Jose, California, United States
Widely recognized as one of the two important pioneers of the personal computer revolution, Steve Wozniak is credited with co-founding Apple Inc. along with Steve Jobs. Not surprisingly, he has been described as one of the men that changed the course of history through technology. Apart from being a programmer and technology entrepreneur, Steve Wozniak is also a well-known philanthropist.
2
Paul Allen(Co-founder of Microsoft, Philanthropist)
Birthdate: January 21, 1953
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: Seattle
Died: October 15, 2018
Paul Allen was an American investor, business magnate, and philanthropist. He is credited with co-founding one of the most popular multinational technology companies in the world, Microsoft Corporation. Along with his philanthropic activities and ownership of several other companies and sporting clubs, Paul Allen had a major impact on sports, wildlife, education, arts, healthcare, community services, environmental conservation, and more.
Birthdate: November 14, 1975
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Babruysk
Gary Vaynerchuk is a Belarusian-American internet entrepreneur who co-founded the restaurant-reservation app Resy and the winery Empathy Wines, apart from launching the YouTube webcast Wine Library TV. He has chaired VaynerX, been the CEO of the social-media consulting firm VaynerMedia, and authored several books, including a business bestseller.
Birthdate: August 17, 1944
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Bronx, New York, United States
Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison was Forbes’s sixth-wealthiest person in the world in 2019. He has been associated with Apple and Tesla, too. He once owned the world’s 12th-largest yacht. He is a certified pilot and also owns a tennis facility. A devoted philanthropist, he has taken The Giving Pledge.
Birthdate: November 3, 1962
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Seattle, Washington
Businessman Gabe Newell is the co-founder and president of the video game developer and digital distribution company, Valve. As a young man, he worked for Microsoft for several years before he quit to found his own venture. He was inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences Hall of Fame in 2013.
6
Kevin Systrom(Computer Programmer, Entrepreneur and Co-Founded of ‘Instagram’)
Birthdate: December 30, 1983
Sun Sign: Capricorn
Birthplace: Holliston, Massachusetts, United States
Computer programmer and entrepreneur Kevin Systrom is one of the co-founders of the photo-sharing app Instagram. He resigned as the Instagram CEO in 2018. He was named to Forbes’s 30 under 30 list in 2014 and was one of the U.S’s richest entrepreneurs below 40 in 2016.
7
Walter O'Brien(Founder and CEO of ‘Scorpion Computer Services, Inc.’)
Birthdate: February 24, 1975
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: County Wexford, Ireland
Irish IT expert and entrepreneur Walter O'Brien produced the CBS action-drama TV series Scorpion, which was inspired by his life. It is believed he established Scorpion Computer Services at age 13 and had an IQ of 197 as a child, though many such claims by him remain unproved.
Birthdate: January 20, 1963
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: Canada
David Baszucki is a Canadian-born American entrepreneur and inventor. He is credited with co-founding the Roblox Corporation, for which he also serves as the CEO. He is also credited with co-founding Knowledge Revolution, a company which was obtained by MSC Software in 1998. In 2017 and 2018, Baszucki was named one of the 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs by Goldman Sachs.
Birthdate: November 26, 1983
Sun Sign: Sagittarius
Birthplace: Hickory, North Carolina
10
Steve Chen(One of the Co-Founders of the Video-Sharing Website ‘YouTube’)
Birthdate: August 25, 1978
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: Taipei City, Taipei, Taiwan
Internet entrepreneur Steve Chen is one of the co-founders of YouTube. He also co-founded AVOS Systems and developed the app MixBit. He later sold YouTube to Google and also joined the investment firm Google Ventures. He was named one of 2011’s "15 Asian Scientists To Watch" by Asian Scientist magazine.
Birthdate: August 5, 1967
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Stanford
Billionaire businessman Reid Hoffman, co-founder of the professional networking platform LinkedIn, also serves as a partner of the firm Greylock Partners. The Stanford and Oxford alumnus is also a prominent philanthropist and has been a board member of Do Something. He has also worked with PayPal and written several books.
Birthdate: September 4, 1983
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: California
Birthdate: November 8, 1970
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: San Diego, California
Tom Anderson is one of the co-founders of Myspace. He would once automatically be made the first “friend” of first-time users of the platform and thus earned the nicknames "Myspace Tom” and “Tom from Myspace.” He is also interested in photography and made a cameo appearance in Funny People.
Birthdate: March 10, 1974
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Birthdate: January 22, 1955
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: Midland, Texas, USA
16
Mike Krieger
(Co-founder of Instagram)
Birthdate: March 4, 1986
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: São Paulo, Brazil
Mike Krieger is a Brazilian-American entrepreneur and software engineer. He co-founded Instagram along with Kevin Systrom. He studied symbolic systems at Stanford University, where he first met Kevin. The two men later sold Instagram to Facebook and began focusing on other projects. Krieger is also a philanthropist and is in a partnership with charity evaluator GiveWell.
Birthdate: June 21, 1967
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: Paris, France
18
Marc Andreessen
(Best Known as Co-Author of 'Mosaic', the First Widely Used Web Browser)
Birthdate: July 9, 1971
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Cedar Falls, Iowa, United States
Marc Andreessen is an American entrepreneur, software engineer, and investor. He is credited with co-founding the independent computer services company Netscape as well as the private venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. Marc Andreessen is also credited with co-authoring one of the first web browsers, NCSA Mosaic. In 1994, he was inducted into the World Wide Web Hall of Fame.
19
Andrew Ng
(American Computer Scientist Who was a Co-Founder and Head of Google Brain)
Birthdate: April 18, 1976
Sun Sign: Aries
Birthplace: London, England
British-American computer scientist and Stanford professor Andrew Ng is also the co-founder of DeepLearning.AI and Coursera. He is best known for his pioneering initiatives in the areas of online education and machine learning. He was also part of the Google Brain team and has co-authored more than 100 research papers.
20
Bobby Murphy
(Co-Founder of Snapchat. and software engineer)
Birthdate: July 19, 1988
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Berkeley, California, United States
Birthdate: 1988 AD
Birthplace: New York City
22
Jerry Yang(Co-Founder and Former CEO of ‘Yahoo! Inc.’)
Birthdate: November 6, 1968
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Taipei City, Taipei, Taiwan
Jerry Yang is a Taiwanese-American billionaire internet entrepreneur, computer programmer, and venture capitalist. Yang is credited with co-founding Yahoo! Inc. where he also served as the CEO from 2007 to 2009. Jerry Yang is also credited with founding a venture capital firm named AME Cloud Ventures.
23
Greg Gianforte
(25th Governor of Montana)
Birthdate: April 17, 1961
Sun Sign: Aries
Birthplace: San Diego, California, United States
24
Apoorva Mehta(American Businessman and Founder of Grocery Delivery Company ‘Instacart’)
Birthdate: 1986 AD
Birthplace: India
Apoorva Mehta is a serial entrepreneur and a former Amazon.com employee. He founded the grocery delivery and pick-up service Instacart in 2012. An engineer by qualification, he tried to start at least 20 other services, including an ad network for social gaming companies, before launching Instacart. He was included in the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2013.
Birthdate: December 5, 1975
Sun Sign: Sagittarius
Birthplace: San Francisco, California, United States
26
Jason Fried
(American Entrepreneur)
Birthdate: 1974 AD
Birthplace: United States
27
Chris DeWolfe
(Entrepreneur)
Birthdate: 1966 AD
Birthplace: Portland, Oregon, United States
28
An Wang(Co-founder of Wang Laboratories)
Birthdate: February 7, 1920
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: Shanghai, China,
Died: March 24, 1990
Born in Shanghai, An Wang studied electrical engineering before moving to Harvard to get his PhD. The Wang Laboratories co-founder is remembered for inventing the magnetic core memory, which was the main component of computers till the invention of the microchip. He also developed many word-processing systems.
29
Louis V. Gerstner Jr.
(Businessman)
Birthdate: March 1, 1942
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Mineola, New York, United States
Birthdate: 1969 AD
Birthplace: Boise, Idaho, United States
31
Gene Amdahl
(Entrepreneur)
Birthdate: November 16, 1922
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Flandreau, South Dakota, United States
Died: November 10, 2015
32
Edward M. Liddy
(Businessman)
Birthdate: January 28, 1946
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: New Brunswick, New Jersey, United States
33
Patrick Joseph McGovern
(Businessman)
Birthdate: August 11, 1937
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Queens, New York, United States
Died: March 19, 2014
Birthdate: May 30, 1990
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: United States
Birthdate: August 6, 1966
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Montevideo
Birthdate: August 25, 1981
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: Boca Raton, Florida, United States