gurunet.com

Founded in 1999 by Bob Rosenschein, GuruNet is backed by leading institutional and individual investors including Highland Capital Partners, JP Morgan Partners, Goldman Sachs, America Online / Time Warner Ventures, Dawntreader Ventures, and Israel Seed Partners.

Bob answers our questions about his company and his business life below:

Your name:                      Bob Rosenschein

Position / title:                 Founder & CEO

Company name:              GuruNet Corporation

Website:                          www.gurunet.com

Your company / website vision statement / goal:

Deliver credible answers on demand.

What you sell / services you offer (brief description of your company):

We offer rich reference information conveniently on demand, some for free, some premium. The free is monetized through an ad model; the premium version is sold by subscription.

Have you always wanted to run your own business? What were some of your previous jobs / companies?

I am a serial entrepreneur, having founded and run companies for over twenty years.

Previous jobs:
Data General [1975-1976]
Bank of Israel [1976-1977]
American Management Systems [1978-1981]

Previous companies:
RSR Associates: technology consulting [1982-1987]
Clients included World Bank, Ashton Tate, CCI
Accent Software: multilingual (international) tools [1987-1998]
We also consulted to Microsoft to develop Middle-Eastern
Windows
GuruNet [1999-present]

Have you got any qualifications? Please tell us about yourself academically?

MIT B.Sc. 1976, Computer Science
Plus experience in software management, systems (OS)
development, application development, sales, support, training,
documentation...

How / when did the idea of your website / company come about?

Based on the suggestion of a friend and investor, Yossi Vardi, who saw previous technology we had developed and suggested the client server model and other product breakthroughs.

If you could give readers of this book one piece of advice what would it be?

Perseverance. It's not about individual successes and failures, but your ability to adapt and adjust to the marketplace.

Who are your role models / mentors and why?

Role model would be Jeff Bezos -- perseverer par excellence -- When everyone said that his Amazon.com was toast, he understood the trends and the future. Also an eternal optimist. Most importantly, Jeff understands that the user/customer is the most important person in any business, and that the user experience is everything.

Excluding yours, what company / website do you like / admire the most?