Brett Hurt – Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder

Data world

Brett is the CEO and Co-founder of data.world, which is building the most meaningful, collaborative, and abundant data resource in the world.  He is also a seed-stage investor at Hurt Family Investments (HFI) in partnership with his wife, Debra. HFI are involved in 45 startups and counting. HFI has made 35 startup investments, 18 of which are Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) companies. Brett has also joined the Advisory Board of eleven additional companies, nine of which are SaaS. Out of the 45 startups HFI are involved in, 32 are headquartered in Austin and 25 are SaaS. HFI are also investors in eleven venture funds - one with Next Coast Ventures, one with Capital Factory, one with Rothenberg Ventures, three in Silicon Valley, one with CAVU Venture Partners, and four with Lead Edge Capital - and these funds hold investments across many startups.

 Brett co-founded Bazaarvoice and served as CEO and President for seven and half years, leading the company from bootstrapped concept to almost 2,000 clients worldwide and through its successful IPO (one of the top five IPOs of 2012 according to the WSJ). He subsequently guided the company through a successful follow-on offering, and two acquisitions, PowerReviews and Longboard Media. Prior to Bazaarvoice, Brett founded Coremetrics and helped grow the company into a global, leading marketing analytics solution for the eCommerce industry before its acquisition by IBM.

 Brett holds an MBA in High-Tech Entrepreneurship from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a BBA in Management Information Systems from the University of Texas at Austin.