about
Great things are never done by one person.
They're done by a team of great people.
Steve Jobs
Background:
Samir Arora is an American entrepreneur, inventor and investor. He is best known as a veteran of Apple Computer and a serial founder, investor and CEO in Silicon Valley with a passion to lead team of incredible people to perform the impossible. He is listed as one of the 100 Internet Pioneers along with Tim Berners-Lee, Marc Andreessen and others, and as the 21 people that shaped the World Wide Web at the 1st Web Innovators Awards by CNET.
He currently is the founder of SageAssist AI and serves as a Managing Partner of the venture firm Information Capital.
While at Apple, Samir wrote the white paper "Information Navigation: the future of Computing" that outlined his vision of Web 1.0 site building platforms, Web 2.0 social networks and Web 3.0 AI, distributed applications and Blockchain. He has spent the last 3 decades building technology and companies to actualize his vision.
Prior to Kyro, Samir helped found Sage Digital in 2016 which built Sage Assist and Sage Places, an AI platform for experts, publishers and businesses, based on his early work at Apple on personal assistants, and Rae Assist in 1994. Sage AI laid the groundwork for the multi–sources data prep, ML, and learning essential for LLMs models, helping build proprietary AI agents today.
While at Apple in the early 90's he worked on "Nodes", a precursor to Blockchains based on a 7 node, serverless protocol and app–enablement platform. In November 2016, Samir started work on one of the first Experts Creator Tokens designed as a "Social Juice" token based on the early block-chain ideas of Web 3.0 peer–to–peer distributed finance applications.
Over the years, Samir has evolved a process from his time at Apple that igniting passion in teams to work together to achieve the extra-ordinary by doing things from the heart, envisioning great change, building with design first, empowering leadership, bringing people deeply together, following a strong code, achieving the impossible, impacting the lives of 100's of millions of people—and as a result transforming ourselves through this process. He is dedicated to mentoring, coaching and building powerful leaders.
He has frequently been featured and quoted over the years, including on the cover of MacWeek, MacWorld, AdWeek, Folio, Business Week, The Wall Street Journal and several times in the New York Times, Fortune, Forbes, Newsweek, The Times, Bloomberg TV, Fox, CNBC, and CNN.
Samir is a frequent keynote speaker in conferences around the globe, and is represented by Celebrity Speakers Limited. Since Apple, Samir has been invited to speak about the changes in the tech, media, publishing and how technology is shaping our future, including keynotes at the first Internet Worlds, early Macintosh/PC Conferences, Media Summit, Bonnier, Grid, Pivot, Technonomy, WPP, DLD, Naspers, TechCrunch, Mobile World, Fortune, and other industry conferences and events.
On April 23th, 2020 Derek Evans, CEO of Marcus Samuelsson Group spoke about the difficulties restaurants, businesses and their employees were facing along with people in need of food as a result of COVID-19 that led the creation of Project Bento to help launch campaigns starting with HarlemServesUp with Chef Marcus Samuelsson, Derek and concerned chefs, owners and celebrities for charities, organizations and fundraisers for relief for restaurants, businesses and their employees. Samir immediately asked Brad Koenig, former Head of Global Technology Investment Banking at Goldman Sachs and one Sage Digital early investors, who felt this was an important cause and joined as one of the founding sponsor donors.
Technology History:
Amazing things created by incredible people—failures are all 100% mine.
Ridiculously Long Background (If you really want to know more or are out of things to do online)
Samir successfully led teams in large $10B+ Fortune 100 corporations, founded several digital companies, serial CEO and led startups to mid-sized global companies. He has raised/managed over 1 $B in private and public equity, pipes, debt & M&A, led an IPO as CEO, been Director & Chairman in public and private Boards, and lead teams of consumer products, digital media sales and management.
Samir started at a young age in professional theatre & music and moved to production & sound engineering before starting to build the first PC kits as a hardware hacker before starting his life-long career in computer software.
He was deeply influenced by a white paper written by John McCarthy, who coined the term "Artificial Intelligence" on the first AI language LISP called the "Recursive Functions of Symbolic Expressions and Their Computation by Machine" and using the white paper built a LISP interpreter as his first software project.
Apple
Information Navigation
He was as an early veteran of Apple Computer from 1982—1991 where he wrote a white paper called "Information Navigation: The Future of Computing" in late 1986 envisioning web applications platforms. He is known for creating the first "External Objects" specification, and coined the terms "MacNavigator" and "MacBrowser".
Personal Assistant AI
Samir worked on the early AI personal assistant prototypes that in part lead to the making of the "Knowledge Navigator" video in 1987, 25 years prior to the launch of Siri at Apple. After Steve Jobs left Apple, Arora worked for the Chairman and CEO John Sculley, at Apple from 1987 to 1991 while continuing his functional career in engineering, products and marketing.
App Development Platforms
While Apple he first worked on the first graphical user systems, languages, desktop publishing then focused on two of the key application products—HyperCard and 4th Dimension. Samir managed the Apple products global rollout and the Apple Developer Services for App development tools before Apple exited the apps and app platforms business.
Apps, API Platforms
In 1990 to 1991 Samir Arora worked on the first tablet Apple called Pen Mac, creating the applications framework and API's to develop the first browsable apps for the operating system created by Paul Mercer, The project later was cancelled by John Sculley in favor of the Newton. When Steve Jobs returned, Apple used PenMac in part to help launch iPod, then iPhone and iPad.
SOLO
While at Apple, Samir created one of the early object oriented frameworks and programming language called SOLO™ (Structure of Linked Objects) that connected apps to databases and communication technologies.
Rae Assist
When Apple decided to exit the apps business to Claris, Samir founded his first startup Rae Technology to work on personal information management apps and personal assistants based on SOLO. Rae Assist™ was one of he first PIM's that included early AI personal assistant with conversation that users could use to do tasks like creating events, finding people and even content.
Web 1.0
NetObjects Fusion
With the launch of Netscape's first Web Browser, NetObjects launched one of the first web-site building products NetObjects Fusion, that has been used to create over 50 million websites. For his early work on the Internet and help coin the term "web-site" he is listed as one of the 100 Internet Pioneers along with Tim Berners-Lee, Marc Andreessen and others and as the 21 people that shaped the World Wide Web at the 1st Web Innovators Awards by CNET.
Web 2.0
Social Networking
Samir joined Tickle, one of the early social networking companies, that was sold to Monster to help compete with LinkedIn.
Project Y/Glam Media/Mode
Samir was one of the founders of Project Y, with the vision that social curation would help people find content, products & videos and served as its CEO from 2006 to 2016. Under his tenure, Glam/Mode Media grew from 10 employees to the #1 Lifestyle Media company, the 6th largest in US Media and #1 Women's Digital Media company in reach with 144 Million US & 400 Million global users a month, managed over 12,000 editors and creators that reached annual revenues of $100 Million–generating $750 Million in revenue in 10 years.
Ning
While at Glam, Samir purchased Ning from Marc Andreessen and help manage the 50,000+ social networks that ran on Ning, including Thisis50 and Linkin Park.
Web 3.0
Team Assist
At Rae Technology, Samir crated a peer-to-peer serverless messaging app to help teams work together including messaging and email, built on NODES.
NODES
Samir created a platform for distributed application for Chevron, by creating a 7 nodes block system that enabled one of the first fully distributed applications. This foundational work is a kew part of Web 3.0 Blockchain chains today and used to create KWS — Kyro Web 3.0 Services in 2021.
Sage Digital AI
One of the ideas that first started in 2012 became significant enough to move to a startup in 2016 and has built an AI–driven Web 3.0 locations, businesses and creators platform. Sage AI laid the groundwork for the multi–sources data prep, ML, and learning essential for LLMs models, helping build proprietary AI agents today.
Additional
Information Capital
Samir helped form Information Capital to help seed, fund and innovate ideas that have the power to transform the world. Woodside Incubator is an accelerator created to help take ideas from seed to Series B venture funding stage.
Arora received the US Entrepreneur of the Year 1997 by IIA and the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year Award for Media in 2009. In 1998 he received the Gold award of the world's best designed consumer products from IDSA. He is listed as co-inventor in 16 US software patents, including the first patent on web site structure editor and the first page layout editor for the web, with 5 patents under file.
Arts
Member of Theatre Action Group (TAG) since an early age, performed in theatre and TV, and later moved to writer, director, music composer and producer of plays and musicals. Was in several productions, including Jesus Christ Superstar (1975–76), Tommy (1978), Death of an Anarchist (1980), and The Day of Atonement (1981). Wrote and produced several plays and musicals: The Pinnacle (1982) and The Vulture Stooped Low (1984), and two musicals: The Wall (1981) and Stronger than Superman (1984). Left the TAG team to join Apple Computer.
TAG was founded by Barry John with with Siddharth Basu, Roshan Seth, Lilette Dubey, Mira Nair, Ravi Dubey, Pamela Rooks and others in 1973 and trained Shahrukh Khan, Manoj Bajpai, Shiney Ahuja, and Freida Pinto.
He has served on the board of trustees of TheatreWorks of San Francisco Bay Area and is an associate producer of that institution.
He started Mode Studios in April 2014 to produce original digital series, films and branded entertainment. In May 2015, Mode Studios film Allen and Alinea directed by Dan Addelson was selected by the American Film Institute in its AFI DOCS 2015 Film Festival. In August 2015, Mode Studios launched the "100 Years" Series, which became the first digital style series to cross 250 million views. Mode Studios has produced 14 digital series and 500+ videos.
Books
Arora is the Editor and Publisher of the book "Foodie Top 100 Restaurants" selected by the World's Top Food Critics and Glam Media's Foodie Editors. a top 300 book on food along with Patricia Wells, Gael Greene, Ruth Reichl, and Masahiro Yamamoto.
Arora is featured in Fearless Genius: The Digital Revolution in Silicon Valley 1985-2000 by Doug Menuez a chronicle of the Silicon Valley technology boom, capturing key moments in the careers of Steve Jobs and other leading innovators as they created today’s digital world.
Health & Wellness: Alternative Medicine
Starting in his career since a young age and leaving the Apple which was struggling without its founder Steve Jobs in the 1990's—left an "emptiness" along with a combination of physical injuries, somatic trauma and the lack of a deeper meaning in his life.
Growing up in an counterculture world of music, arts, liberalism, sexual revolution and activism as a part of his theatre, writing and music upbringing planted the seeds of seeking out alternative modalities of healing. He was drawn to the human potential movement that was growing in California. A series of life events brought him to seek help at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California in 1991 where he started to study forms of alternative health therapies and eastern philosophies.
While at Esalen he met the master body worker Dub Leigh, who was one of the only people who was simultaneously trained by Ida Rolf, Moshe Feldenkrais and the Zen Master Tanouye Rotaishi. Samir shared a long-term personal relationship with Dub till his passing, and was asked by Dub to be chairman of the body therapy organization and continue to learn other healing modalities. Given the personal transformation Samir expereinced through this work, he volunteers his time doing 1-1 sessions, leading groups and teaching as a path of service to give back to others.
Over the years he was certified in structural body therapy (AISI) and studied various forms of osteopathic and structural bodywork—Dub Leigh's Bodytherapy/Ida Rolf's Structural Integration, Moshe Feldenkrais' Functional Integration, Trigger Point Therapy, Lauren Berry's Joint Work, Trager Approach, Energy Healing, BKS Iyengar, Shivananda, Vivekanada & Laya Yoga, Charles Muir Sacred Sexuality, Tantra Yoga, and Natural Remedies.
Samir Arora is the President of the non-profit organization International Zen Bodywork Institute, Inc. (IZII) founded by Dub Leigh with Daihonzan Chozen-ji He currently serves as its President and is the Shike of IZII and Zen Bodywork, Integrated Therapy, and is the Founder and Sōke of Yūdō, The Healing Way, as a lay Rinzai Rōshi, the successor of Dub Leigh, under Tenshin Tanouyein, in the the Tenryū-ji lineage of Ōmori Sōgen.