Payam Zamani

Payam Zamani
Ethnicity Persian
Alma mater University of California, Davis
Occupation Business executive

Payam Zamani is the chairman and CEO of Reply!, Inc., which operates an online marketplace for the acquisition of locally targeted consumers traffic.[1] Zamani is a member of the Bahá'í Faith and was forced to escape religious persecutions in Iran. He came to the U.S. as a refugee in 1988 at the age of 16.[2]

Zamani’s serial entrepreneurship began in 1994 when he co-founded Autoweb.com, the first online car buying service. In 1999 he helped to take the company public. The company’s market cap ultimately reached $1.2 billion.

Zamani later founded PurpleTie, before starting Reply! in 2001. In May 2011, Reply! acquired MerchantCircle, an online network of business owners, for $60 million in cash and stock.[3]

Philanthropy

Zamani is on the board of Mona Foundation, which is focused on improving education around the world, particularly for women. Payam lobbied the board of Reply.com, to donate one percent of all its profits to Mona each year.[4]

References

  1. ↑ "Entrepreneur Profile: Payam Zamani". San Francisco Business TImes. 10 July 2007.
  2. ↑ Rice, Bill (July 22, 2008). "Q&A with Lead Generation Leadership: Talking with Payam Zamani of Reply!". LeadMarketwatch. Archived from the original on July 24, 2010. Retrieved October 23, 2013.
  3. ↑ "Reply acquires MerchantCircle for $60M", Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal, May 26, 2011
  4. ↑ Meghan Kelly, "Rainn Wilson calls on Silicon Valley to give back this holiday season", VentureBeat, December 21, 2011