BUSINESS BECAUSE CO-FOUNDER BIO


Maria is co-founder of BusinessBecause.com, a professional networking and news site for the business school world. Visit the site for info on MBA jobs, MBA rankings and the popular Why MBA series! Based in London, she’s interested in education, the Gen Y job market, and all things China.


MBA Start-ups: Actually Pretty Impressive!


Over four years of covering MBA students, I’ve heard plenty of skepticism about their ability to run successful start-ups, which is rough considering that more MBA grads than ever are setting up their own businesses!


Entrepreneurship isn’t something that can be learned at school, say skeptics. There’s certainly truth in this: most successful entrepreneurs are marked out by their drive and ability to get things done, rather than what university they went to.


However in the interests of balancing out the “haters”, I wanted to highlight a few tech start-ups founded by MBAs that really are impressive and doing something new in super competitive markets. Some of them are even household names!


Zynga – Social Gaming Company Behind FarmVille, CityVille, Texas Hold-em Poker and More!


Founder: Mark Pincus, Harvard MBA Class of 1993


Zynga is the creator of the best known game on Facebook – FarmVille. Pincus, who named the firm after his pet dog, was formerly an investment banker and venture capitalist. He has a BS in Economics but founded his first tech start-up in 1995, selling it for US $38 million seven months later. He put his MBA to good use, leading Zynga through an IPO in December 2011. The company’s share price has dropped from $10 to $3.6, but in January 2013 Zynga games had more than 265 million monthly users and three of the top five Facebook games.


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