Overview
Registration for this event is closed. Please email techevents@bloomberg.net to join the wait list.
Bloomberg, Cornell Tech, and Tech:NYC invite you to join us for the latest installment of the Cornell Tech @ Bloomberg speaker series, featuring Shan-Lyn Ma, co-founder and CEO of wedding company Zola, in conversation with Scarlet Fu of Bloomberg Television.
Ma co-founded Zola with Nobu Nakaguchi in 2013 after having had poor online experiences purchasing gifts for friends who were getting married at the time. They launched Zola as a single-destination online platform where couples could register for and guests could purchase gifts from a range of brands, including products, experiences, and gift cards.
Since then, the company has raised more than $140 million in funding and expanded its product offerings to address other components of the wedding planning process, such as guest list management and website creation. Zola’s registry service now offers over 60,000 products and experiences through its partnerships with brands. Those partners hold inventory and fulfill orders, while Zola focuses on delivering a great online experience for its couples and their guests. And it’s captured an increasing share of the $19 billion that’s spent annually on wedding gifts in the U.S., with more than 500,000 couples using its service to date.
We hope you’ll join us for this conversation with Ma, in which she’ll discuss the process of fundraising for, launching, and scaling Zola and the tech-enabled evolution of the wedding industry. We’ll also cover Ma’s own path as an entrepreneur, which began with an admiration for Yahoo! co-founder Jerry Yang, while she was growing up in Australia, and ultimately led her to Stanford and a job at Yahoo!, where she began her career in tech.
Twitter: @TechAtBloomberg
Facebook: Cornell Tech @ Bloomberg
Agenda
- 5:30PM
Cocktail reception begins
- 6:00PM
Doors close, conversation starts
- 6:45PM
Audience Q&A with Cornell Tech students
- 7:00PM
Networking and hors d’oeuvres to follow
-
PLEASE NOTE: Seating is limited and registered attendees will be seated on a first come, first served basis. Doors close promptly at the top of the hour. Individuals arriving late may be turned away from the building. No walk-ins allowed.
Questions: techevents@bloomberg.net
Featured speaker
Shan-Lyn Ma
Shan-Lyn Ma is CEO and co-founder of Zola, the wedding company reinventing the wedding planning and registry experience by combining compassionate customer service with modern tools and technology. Zola launched in 2013 and quickly became the fastest-growing wedding company in the country. Today, Zola carries over 500 brands—from registry staples to up-and-coming designers—and over half a million couples have used the platform. The company’s suite of tools includes: the premier all-in-one wedding registry, free wedding websites, a guest-list manager, customizable checklist and beautiful save the dates and wedding invitations.
Before starting her company, Shan was Chief Product Officer of Chloe + Isabel. Prior to that, Shan was Gilt Groupe’s first product lead, where she led key new business launches, including their successful foray into mobile. Additionally, she was creator and general manager of Gilt Taste, the brand’s food and wine division. Before her time at Gilt, Shan held product and marketing roles at Yahoo!. She holds a degree in BCommerce with First Class Honours from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, and an MBA from Stanford University.
When & where
Thursday, September 13, 2018
5:30pm – 8:00pm EDT
Bloomberg L.P.,
731 Lexington Ave.
New York, NY