Bill Townsend

Bill Townsend (born 1964) is an entrepreneur who helped build several global companies, most notably search engine Lycos, social networking pioneer sixdegrees.com, whose intellectual property formed the basis of LinkedIn, GeoCities (sold to Yahoo!) and Deja.com (sold to Google and ebay). Townsend is President & CEO of RevolutionSports and Classic Wrestling Revolution.[1] He is an author, motivational speaker, and guest lecturer at conferences and universities worldwide, including TED.[2]

Career

Townsend has founded, co-founded or served on the executive management team or board of directors at several leading Internet companies most notably Internet search engine Lycos[3] and Newegg.com.

Townsend founded RevolutionSports in 2014 along with 5-time World Champion professional wrestler Shane Douglas to bring a new form of live event and television production to the field of combat sport, focusing on real competition and not fake “sports entertainment”. Upon learning of their plans, Hall of Fame professional wrestler Rowdy Roddy Piper cancelled his contract with WWE to join the company.[4] After Piper’s untimely death in 2015, another Hall of Famer, Jake Roberts, more commonly known as Jake “The Snake” Roberts, joined to fill Piper’s role as color commentator.

RevolutionSports’ first production, Classic Wrestling Revolution, features 343 live shows a year at Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino, owned by Caesars Entertainment Corporation and 48 hours of weekly television in English, Spanish, Chinese and Japanese, reaching over 2.3 billion consumers. The television programs includes Reality Television and live matches and a competition much like The Voice (U.S. TV series). Eight world champion coaches, including Road Warrior Animal, Tully Blanchard of The Four Horsemen, Big Van Vader, “The Hammer” Greg Valentine, Chavo Guerrero Sr., Juventud Guerrera, Jazz (wrestler) and Último Dragón, will draft 64 male and female athletes from an estimated 300 contestants who have signed to participate, to be part of their teams. Contrary to wrestling promotions like WWE, TNA, ROH and mixed martial arts promotions like UFC, who hire athletes as independent contractors, all the athletes in Classic Wrestling Revolution will be salaried, full-time employees, receiving benefits including health, vision and dental insurance, 401k plan, and profit sharing.[5]

Classic Wrestling Revolution's television programming is led by executive producers Christo Garcia and Glenn "GT" Taylor, formerly executive producer of Bar Rescue and director of the Endemol and ABC Television hit television show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, Juan Puerto and Julio Rumbaut, the latter the co-founder of Spanish language television leader Telemundo.[6][7][8]

Townsend is a partner in PacAirVentures, a global developer of entertainment complexes, featuring unique entertainment, retail and restaurant concepts including kinetic body flight, aka, vertical wind tunnels, network connected gaming arenas, stem cell and DNA repair centers, music products and music performance immersion camps, and others, operated through the brand name PAVA. For many years he served on the Board of Directors of Newegg.com, the second largest pureplay e-commerce retailer,[9] and created the company's FirstFromASIA division,[10] which brings Asia's hottest, trendsetting products to the U.S. market.

Townsend appeared on ABC Television's Extreme Makeover Home Edition in 2010, when his charity assisted a family of nine that lost their home in fire, restore and acquire musical instruments.[11] He also appeared on CNBC's Treasure Detectives in 2013 unveiling a $12,000,000 violin by Antonio Stradivari [12]

Publications

Yes You Can! How to Be a Success no Matter Who You Are or Where You're From was released on paperback and Kindle e-book in July 2012 and was released as an e-book in Russia, Japan, China and Taiwan in 2013.[13]

Townsend, and co-author Gary Carini, Associate Dean at Baylor University, were published in Harvard Business Review on the subject employee entrepreneurship.[14] Townsend was also featured in Wooster Magazine in 2015, highlighting his career and Classic Wrestling Revolution.[15]

Inventions

Townsend is an inventor whose products have included technology products and processes, acousto-haptics, in-arena technologies, the carbonixx guitar pick line, Blaxx drum sets, Storyline Stxx drum sticks, Il Cremonese violin treatments, and thermal footwear designed for motorcycling.[16]

Education

Townsend earned an MBA from Baylor University's Hankamer School of Business where he held the John Schoen Entrepreneur-in-Residence chair and lectured on leadership and entrepreneurship.[17] He earned his BA at The College of Wooster.[18]

Philanthropy

In 2000, Townsend founded The Amati Foundation, to help expand the stringed arts, specifically education in playing, making, and preserving the violin.[19] In 2006, he released a seminal study on consumer attitudes toward classical music events and how those attitudes affect attendance at orchestras in the United States and Europe. The study was featured in The Strad magazine. In 2009, The Amati Foundation moved its headquarters to California and opened an office in Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China. In 2010, The Amati Foundation partnered with ABC Television's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.

Townsend began studying violin making under the tutelage of Ziang Mei then continued learning techniques from William Hilton (a student of Vhakn Nigogosian), and Alberti Genduso (who has studied with the German masters Horst Kloss and Karl Roy, director of the Bavarian State School of Violin Making in Mittenwald, Germany). In 2005 he introduced a wood treatment system to increase sonority and harmonics in instrument making. This system, Il Cremonese Violin Treatments, creates a base chemically matching the ground used by Antonio Stradivari from which to apply varnish and protect wood.[20][21] One of his instruments was featured in The Smithsonian Institution's Heart & Hands exhibition about musical instruments and their makers. He donates 50% of his instrument sales to charity.[22]

Townsend is the son of Jacquelyn Mayer, Miss America 1963 and contributes time and funding to women's education and empowerment causes.[23]

Politics

Townsend was the 1992 Republican candidate for United States Congress in Pennsylvania's 20th Congressional District, narrowly losing by 1½% to 16-year Democrat incumbent Austin J. Murphy.[24][25]

References

  1. ↑
  2. ↑
  3. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2007-04-04. Retrieved 2007-04-20.
  4. ↑
  5. ↑
  6. ↑
  7. ↑
  8. ↑
  9. ↑ "Computer Parts, PC Components, Laptop Computers, LED LCD TV, Digital Cameras and more!". Newegg.com. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  10. ↑ "Newegg Launches "First From Asia" Program". Marketwire.com. 2011-11-30. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  11. ↑ "Amati Foundation & Extreme Makeover: Home Edition". Amatifoundation.org. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  12. ↑ "Afghanistan: Inside a Firefight".
  13. ↑ "Yes You Can : How to Be a Success no Matter Who You Are or Where You're From: Bill Townsend: Amazon.com: Kindle Store". Amazon.com. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  14. ↑
  15. ↑
  16. ↑ "NEW Bill Townsend Chinook Sock". Retrieved 2013-02-11.
  17. ↑ "Baylor University || Executive MBA". Baylor.edu. 2012-01-09. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  18. ↑ "Wooster Alumni Community - Margaret Miller Townsend '37". Woosteralumni.org. 2009-10-13. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  19. ↑ "Become A Patron". Amatifoundation.org. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  20. ↑  . "Techie enjoys new life as a violinmaker - YNN - Your News Now". Austin.ynn.com. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  21. ↑ Los Angeles Times Magazine, December 2004 print edition
  22. ↑ "William Townsend Violins". Townsendviolins.com. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  23. ↑ "Motivational & Inspirational Speaker". Jackie Mayer. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  24. ↑ Lawrence Kestenbaum. "Index to Politicians: Townsend". The Political Graveyard. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
  25. ↑ The Congressional Record and Republican National Committee
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