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Suneet Wadhwa, Entrepreneur-in-Residence
Suneet Wadhwa is an entrepreneur in Silicon Valley. An early proponent of user-generated media and viral marketing, he was the visionary and co-founder behind Snapfish, where he served as its Vice President of Business Development. In that capacity, he co-led fundraising efforts for its Series A and Series B rounds for a total of $7m and $36m, respectively. In addition, Suneet led deal-making for strategic investments from Kodak and Compaq, and headed a business development team of seven in closing over 60 distribution deals, driving revenue growth and market penetration. Snapfish is now a subsidiary of HP.
Before Snapfish, Suneet was Director of Corporate Development at Excite@Home, the leading high-speed cable Internet service provider until 2002, which serviced 4.1 million subscribers in the U.S. and abroad at its peak. While at Excite@Home, Suneet drove roughly $20m in revenue for the news and business verticals, formulating and negotiating some of the earliest content partnerships with major media companies, including CNN, Bloomberg, The Weather Channel, and Fox News.
Suneet later co-founded Engage, the world’s first social dating service, where he served as its Chief Executive Officer, managing a team of over 25 at its peak. As the visionary behind Engage, Suneet was deeply involved in directing product marketing and development efforts, focusing on providing the best user experience possible. As part of this process, Suneet co-invented multiple patent-pending processes designed to facilitate the introduction of compatible individuals. Under Suneet’s leadership, the company raised over $8m in debt and equity while growing to over 800,000 members before being acquired by Spark Networks (Amex: LOV). Suneet is now working on his 3rd company, iterating on ideas that have mass market appeal with viral characteristics and network effects. He continues to act as an advisor to multiple start-up companies in the Bay Area, and for 15 years has been focused on creating disruptive products and services that can make an impact on the world around us.
Suneet earned his MBA from Harvard Business School and his BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Arizona.