Naveen Jain

Naveen Jain was born in 1959 to a Jain family. He grew up in New Delhi and in villages in Uttar Pradesh, India. Jain moved to Roorkee, where in 1979 he earned an engineering degree from IIT Roorkee. He moved to the United States that same year. He looked up to business people who made their own fortune, especially Bill Gates. == Early career ==

Jain's first job out of college in 1983 was at Burroughs (now known as Unisys) in New Jersey as part of a business-exchange program. He moved to Silicon Valley for its warmer climate and worked for "a bunch of startups" before joining Microsoft in 1989. Jain worked on OS/2, then MS-DOS, Windows NT, and Windows 95. He was awarded three patents related to Windows 95 and became best known for his work as a program manager. Jain joined the management team for Microsoft Network, prior to its launch. According to Red Herring, he became restless after eight years at the company and said he didn't feel a single person could make a difference at a large company like Microsoft. Naveen Jain was working on the launch of Microsoft Networks (MSN), when Netscape Communications raised $2.2 billion in an initial public offering in 1995. NetScape's IPO was considered the start of the dot-com bubble, because it showed that Internet companies can have large IPOs without making a profit first. Naveen quit Microsoft to start InfoSpace that year, with the aim of having his own initial public offering as quickly as possible. == InfoSpace ==

Growth Jain founded InfoSpace in March 1996 with six employees, mostly from Microsoft, and began developing e-mail and telephone directories. The company grew at low cost without funding using co-branding strategies. Jain's net worth grew to $8 billion. He began purchasing expensive homes and yachts. Also, in 2000, InfoSpace used a controversial accounting method to report $46 million in profits when in fact it had lost $282 million. Company executives skirted SEC trading restrictions to sell large blocks of their personal stock. Jain resumed the role of CEO in 2001. As revenues decreased, Jain indicated to investor analysts that revenues were expected to go up, even though all indicators showed a continued decline. Jain was forced out by InfoSpace's board as chairman and CEO in December 2002. In 2003 Jain was ordered to pay $247 million for violations in "short-swing trading rules", whereby he bought and sold stocks within six months as an employee with insider knowledge. In appeals court the Securities and Exchange Commission submitted a brief taking Jain's side, Jain said his stock purchasing was a mistake due to bad advice from his legal and financial advisors. In March 2003, InfoSpace sued Jain and others for allegedly misappropriating trade secrets from InfoSpace to start Intelius and for violating their non-compete agreement. A court found no evidence that Intelius and Infospace competed with one another and the case was dismissed. In December 2004, an $83 million settlement was reached between InfoSpace and Jain, which would result in dismissal of all the cases, including the one from the shareholder, with prejudice. == Post-InfoSpace ==

Intelius In 2003, Jain co-founded Intelius. The company collected and sold background information on individuals. It grew to $18.1 million in revenues by 2004 and $88.5 million in 2007 with $22.5 million in profits. It filed an initial public offering in 2008. The site was the subject of many consumer complaints concerning post-transaction marketing practices, where consumers were led to believe they were answering a short survey for $10 cash back, but were actually signed up for a $20-per-month subscription. He re-formed the company under the name Inome in 2012. In 2015 the company was sold, with Jain retaining a 25 percent interest, and a new CEO was appointed. TalentWise Jain founded Talentwise, a spin-off from Intelius, which was sold in 2016. Moon Express Jain co-founded Moon Express in August 2010 and is its chairman. The company is building machine-operated spacecraft to mine materials like gold, cobalt, platinum, and Helium-3 (nuclear energy fuel) from the Moon. It will also prospect for water on the Moon's south pole, which could be used to create rocket fuel for missions to Mars and beyond. Jain claimed his target for Moon Express was to found human colonies on the Moon by 2022. Bluedot Jain is founder and CEO of Bluedot. Started in 2015, Bluedot licenses research from United States Department of Energy national labs for commercialization. Jain is founder and CEO of Bluedot's spinoff Viome (founded in 2016). Viome provides nutritional genomics testing and analysis services, especially of the gut flora, and provides dietary advice. Other activities Jain is a member of the board of Kairos Society, a non-profit network of undergraduate entrepreneurs, founded by his son. Jain collects meteorites. His collection, which by 2012 had cost him $5 million, consists of 'witnessed falls'; meteorites that observers have seen moving through the atmosphere. == Personal life ==

Jain married in 1988 and moved with his family to Seattle. == References ==