Hoegh graduated from
Northwestern University in 1992 with a bachelor's degree in communication in theatre. He was a member of the
Delta Tau Delta fraternity. While at Northwestern, he was a co-chair of
The Waa-Mu Show in 1990 and 1991. Hoegh was the founder, co-owner and artistic director of Norwegian Performance Ltd, an Oslo-based production company specialising in multimedia performances, dance, events and concerts. Hoegh was the artistic director of “Folkefest,” a festival of peace to mark the 50th anniversary of the end of
World War II, and assistant artistic director for the opening and closing ceremonies for the
1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer. Hoegh then received an MBA from
Harvard Business School in 1997 and founded his London-based company Arts Alliance, builders and backers of high-growth ventures in the creative and tech sectors. Hoegh was among Europe's earliest internet investors and has often been ahead of the curve with new and disruptive technologies. Among his earliest investments were
Firefly, an online community that used collaborative filtering to recommend music and other media, which sold to
Microsoft in 1998, and
PlanetAll, among the first social networking sites on the internet (sold to
Amazon in 1998). Arts Alliance has been involved in more than 60 start-ups including
Shazam,
Picturehouse,
Opera Software,
Firefly,
PlanetAll,
Ocado,
LoveFilm,
lastminute.com, Arts Alliance Media, Kiala,
graze, Branient, blinkbox, Spoonshot AI,
made.com, CreativeLive, Spinner, Kenshoo,
Park Circus, MetFilm/
Met Film School,
Kebony, and Garden Studios. Throughout their 25-year history, Arts Alliance have been central to a number of “firsts” in the digital and creative world. Thomas Hoegh founded Arts Alliance Media in 2003, a
digital cinema company that in 2005 was responsible for the conversion of over 250 UK cinema screens from analog to digital as part of the
UK Film Council’s Digital Screen Network. Arts Alliance Media also rolled out the first ever
Virtual Print Fee (VPF) in Europe with French cinema chain CGR in 2008. Art Alliance Media spun off separate companies in content mastering and live event cinema before being sold to Chinese cinema tech company Luxin-Rio in 2017. Arts Alliance bought DVDs On Tap and relaunched it as
LoveFilm in 2003. The re-imagined proposition became an early leader in online film rentals and streaming and was considered the “
Netflix of Europe.” LoveFilm sold the first-ever digital film online in 2006, before being acquired by
Amazon in 2011. Hoegh was also an early investor in
Picturehouse which operates 25 cinemas across the UK and was the first major chain to convert all of its screens to digital projection. Picturehouse was acquired by
Cineworld in 2012. Today, Hoegh sits on the boards of Eco-Online, Met Film, Park Circus, Rift Valley Corporation, and Garden Studios. ==Arts Alliance Productions==