The recipient of a bachelor of science in business from Florida State University, Alex Hern gained national acclaim as a tech entrepreneur in 1996 with the establishment of Inktomi, Inc., which developed key software for the search engine HotBot. The following year, while living in San Diego, Alex Hern founded the seed-stage venture fund MILCOM Technologies, which gave way to the creation of 14 companies that attracted a combined $600 million in venture capital from prominent firms such as IBM, Oak Investment Partners, and Bessemer Venture Partners. Hern later created Yesmail.com, which became one of the 10 most-visited websites in the late 1990s and was eventually purchased by CMGI for more than $500 million.
To date, Alex Hern has established more than a dozen successful startups and acquired several others. His most recent endeavor is the San Diego County-based Tsunami XR, which he launched in 2011 as a software and content-solutions provider for the enterprise market. Stressing workplace productivity and collaboration, Tsunami XR offers 3-D and augmented-reality conferencing programs that are utilized by global companies across a variety of business sectors.