Nicholas Grouf General Information

Description

Mr. Nicholas Grouf serves as Managing Partner at Alpha Edison. He is an entrepreneur and investor. He serves as a Board Member at Emagispace. In 1995, he built his first company, Firefly Network, to focus on developing and commercializing collaborative filtering - this core technology still powers the targeting of custom user preferences by companies such as Amazon and Netflix today. In 1999, after selling Firefly to Microsoft, he co-founded one of the first ISPs, PeoplePC, which he took public and merged with Earthlink, followed a few years later by Spot Runner, an internet-based platform to produce, buy, place, and distribute targeted cable TV ads. Most recently, he incubated and helped build several successful startups out of his Melrose headquarters, including Loot Crate (named Inc. magazine's "Fastest-Growing Private Company of 2016") and Pluto TV, a streaming web platform that was acquired by Viacom in 2019. He currently serves on the Boards of The Hammer Museum, Trajal Harrell Dance Company, and Walther School Foundation. He funded a pediatric neurology study at Cornell University, as well as established scholarships related to social entrepreneurship and public health at Harvard University, Yale University, and the Horace Mann School. He serves as Board Member at United Dwelling.