Tony Hsieh

In 1999, at the age of 24, Tony Hsieh (pronounced Shay) sold LinkExchange, the company he co-founded, to Microsoft for $265 million. He then joined Zappos as an advisor and investor, and eventually became CEO, where he helped Zappos grow from almost no sales to over $1 billion in gross merchandise sales annually, while simultaneously making Fortune Magazine’s annual “Best Companies to Work For” list. In November 2009, Zappos was acquired by Amazon.com in a deal valued at $1.2 billion on the day of closing.

In addition to his responsibilities as CEO of Zappos.com, Hsieh is leading the “Downtown Project,” a group committed to transforming downtown Las Vegas into the most community-focused large city in the world.  This transformation includes the relocation of the Zappos offices from Henderson, Nevada to what was the old City Hall in downtown Las Vegas.