Jordan Levy is a no-nonsense businessman. He works hard to insure that his investments add value to a company, and that is exactly what they have done for several companies, including Betaworks, Lover.ly, and Synacor. General Partner at SoftBank Capital NY, Levy is also Managing Partner of Seed Capital Partners, an early stage venture capital fund that he co-founded in 1999.
Levy graduated from the University of Buffalo in 1977 and started his career as an administrative assistant in the New York State Senate in Albany. Since then, he has co-founded several companies including ClientLogic, where he also served as President, Co-CEO and Co-Chair of its predecessor, Softbank Services Group and UCA (now SITEL Worldwide). Previously, Levy was SVP of Software Etc,now GameStop and prior to that he co-founded QSR Brands and Software Distribution Services, now known as Ingram Micro, where he also served as Executive Vice President.
Levy also serves on the Board of Directors of technology companies including Synaptic Digital, Spanfeller Media, ZipList, JumpPost, OMGPOP (acquired by Zynga), SocialFlow, HyperPublic (acquired by Groupon), Boxee, Betaworks, Cokem International, and serves as Chairman of Synacor. He also advises GripeO, CoachMePlus, Decision Pace and AweSweet.
He remains active in the Buffalo community, where he lives with his wife and serves as Chair of the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corporation, the State Agency responsible for the redevelopment of Buffalo’s vast historic waterfront. He is also on the Advisory Board for NYC Seed and a trustee of the University of Buffalo Foundation. He served for nine years as a trustee of the Albright Knox Art Gallery and is a past President of the Jewish Federation of Greater Buffalo.
VC Firm: SoftBank Capital, Seed Capital Partners
Expertise Areas:
Mobile applications and devices, ecommerce, online advertising, social media, gaming, and cloud-based enterprise services
Boards:
Synaptic Digital, Spanfeller Media, ZipList, JumpPost, OMGPOP (acquired by Zynga), SocialFlow, HyperPublic (acquired by Groupon), Boxee, Betaworks, Cokem International, Synacor
Investments:
Betaworks
Lover.ly
Synacor
Anystream, Inc.
InsiderPages
The NewsMarket
Thumbplay
Websites:
Memorable Quote:
“If I cannot add value I will not invest in a deal. No passive investing.”
