Jim Manzi

Jim Manzi (born, 1951) is the former Chairman, President and CEO of Lotus Development Corporation and is currently a private investor in various technology start-up ventures.

Early career

Manzi received his B.A. in Classics from Colgate University in 1973, and later received his M.A. in International Relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. His wife Glenda(a former three time Emmy award winning public television documentary producer) was a reporter at "Westchester-Rockland, N.Y., Newspapers", which is how he met her. [ [http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.stanford.edu/group/mmdd/SiliconValley/Upside/1992/Feb.1992.Manzi.rtf http://www.stanford.edu/group/mmdd/SiliconValley/Upside/1992/Feb.1992.Manzi.rtf] ] Later, Manzi worked as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company where he worked extensively with Fortune 500 clients as well as offshore clients in Latin America, Europe and Asia. [ [http://www.interwise.com/about/investors.html Interwise: True Enterprise Conferencing:Interwise Investors] ]

Lotus

In 1982 Manzi went to Lotus Development Corporation as a consultant for McKinsey and Company and became an employee three months later. In 1984, he became President and two years later became Chairman and CEO succeeding founder Mitchell Kapor who had been concentrating exclusively on products like Jazz and Agenda for two years.

Manzi's most notable contribution at Lotus was steering the company from desktop applications (i.e. Lotus 1-2-3) towards collaborative software, also known as groupware or workgroup computing software (i.e. Lotus Notes). In the spring of 1995 IBM launched a hostile bid for Lotus with a $60-per-share tender offer, when Lotus' stock was only trading at $32. Manzi looked for potential white knights, and forced IBM to increase its bid to $64.50 per share, for a $3.5 billion buyout of Lotus. [ [http://www.crn.com/it-channel/18825870 Jim Manzi - IT Channel - IT Channel News by CRN and VARBusiness:By Barbara Darrow (From the December 12, 2003 issue of CRN)] ] On October 11, 1995 Manzi announced his resignation from the Lotus Development division of IBM.

Career after Lotus

Since 1995, with his investment company, Stonegate Capital, Manzi has been involved in the creation and development of a number of technology start-up ventures. [ [http://www.interwise.com/about/investors.html Interwise: True Enterprise Conferencing:Interwise Investors] ]

On May 25, 2000, Manzi made an investment in Interwise and joined its Board. He went on to become chairman of Interwise, a web- and voice conferencing company which was sold to AT&T in 2007. In 2000, Manzi was also appointed to the board of directors of Thermo Electron Corporation, and became chairman of the board at Thermo in December 2003, succeeding Richard Syron. Thermo subsequently acquired Fisher Scientific in 2006. Manzi remains Chairman of the combined ThermoFisher, a $10 billion company serving the life sciences industry. He is involved in several other companies including Freshdirect in NYC where he is a board member and early investor; Gather.com, a user-generated content site in Boston; and a number of Israeli start-ups.

Manzi made a headlines in 1999 as a high-profile fundraiser for Presidential candidate Bill Bradley.

External links

* [http://www.gather.com/my.jsp?memberId=13027 Jim Manzi's Article (The End of the Literary Industrial Complex)]
* [http://www.crn.com/sections/special/hof/hof03.jhtml;?articleId=18825870&_requestid=226714 2003 Industry Hall of Fame: Jim Manzi]
* [http://www.businessweek.com/1997/21/b352874.htm Were Jim Manzi's Big Ideas Too Big?]
* [http://www.wohl.com/g0001.htm Manzi Resigns At Lotus]
* [http://www.interwise.com/pressrelease/press_detail.asp?pressid=25 InterWise Appoints Former Lotus Chief, Jim Manzi, to Board of Directors]
* [http://www.boston.com/business/personaltech/articles/2006/01/14/one_stop_site_for_blogs_offered/ One-stop site for blogs offered] - "The Boston Globe"
* [http://www.willamette.edu/cla/classics/VIPs/manzi.html Willamette University - VIP Jim Manzi]

References

*Darrow, Barbara. "2003 Industry Hall of Fame: Jim Manzi". CRN, December 15, 2003
*Judge, Paul C. and Baker, Stephen. "Were Jim Manzi's Big Ideas Too Big?". BusinessWeek, May 26, 1997
* [http://www.techweb.com/wire/26803343 "Former Lotus Chief Manzi Heads Up Another Venture". TechWeb.com, December 09, 2003]