Brian Wong | |
|---|---|
 Brian Wong c. 2012 | |
| Born | April 14, 1991 |
| Occupations | Founder and former CEO of Kiip |
Brian Wong (born April 14, 1991) is a Canadian Internet entrepreneur. In 2010, Wong co-founded Kiip (pronounced "keep"), a company offering a mobile app rewards platform through which computer game players would receive real-world rewards from brands and companies for in-game achievements.
Wong was born and raised in Vancouver, British Columbia, to parents of Hong Kong descent. His father was an accountant and his mother was a nurse. [1] He received his high school diploma at the age of 14, after twice skipping two grades at the University Transition Program at the University of British Columbia (UBC). [2] Wong received a bachelor's degree from UBC at the age of 18. [3] While at university, Wong launched his first company, FollowFormation, which Mashable called "the easiest way to follow the top Twitterers by subject matter or topic." [4] [5] [6] One of his most recent ventures, Kiip, made him one of the youngest internet entrepreneurs to raise venture capital. [7]
In 2010, Wong worked in business development for the news aggregator Digg, leading the development and release of the Digg Android Mobile App. Soon after a joining and after a disastrous redesign, Digg had a round of corporate layoffs. Wong was let go after five months, an experience that eventually led to him opening his own business. [8]
Wong received the initial inspiration for Kiip on an airplane at age 19 as he observed his fellow passengers interacting with their iPads. [9] [10] He noticed that many passengers were playing games, and felt that the games' advertisements took up screen space without adding any real value. [10] Because he perceived that games are a "holy grail of achievement", Wong wanted to leverage key moments of achievement—such as level ups and high scores—with a targeted, relevant rewards program that enabled brands to reach consumers when they were most engaged. [2] [3] [11]
In July 2010, Wong teamed with his fellow former Digg employees Courtney Guertin and their mutual friend Amadeus Demarzi to found Kiip. [12] As of 2017, Kiip was sending achievement-based rewards such as coupons to 100 million consumers per month, [13] and had raised more than $32 million of venture capital from various sources, including Relay Ventures, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, True Ventures, Verizon Ventures, and Crosslink Capital. [14] Kiip has offices in San Francisco, New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Tokyo and London. [15] The company established strategic partnerships with more than 40 major brands, including 1-800-Flowers, Amazon.com, American Apparel, Best Buy, Carl's Jr., Disney, Dr. Pepper, GNC, KY Jelly, Pepsi, Playboy, Popchips, Sephora, Victoria's Secret, and Vitamin Water. [16] [17] [18] Kiip was on track to do more than $20 million in revenue in 2017. [19] [ needs update ]
In 2010, Wong became one of the youngest company leaders to ever receive funding from a venture capital firm. [8] [20] He was called a self-made millionaire by the time he was 20 years old. [21] By 2012 he had spoken at several popular conferences, including TEDx and South by Southwest. [22] [23] Wong and Kiip were profiled in such global publications such as Forbes , Entrepreneur , The Wall Street Journal , The New York Times , and Inc. Magazine, [8] [16] [24] [25] [26] and he was on the cover of the September 2014 issue of Entrepreneur as one of the young millionaires changing the world. [27] Wong was named in the Forbes 30 Under 30 Social/Mobile list in 2011. [28]
Wong is the author of The Cheat Code: Going Off Script to Get More, Go Faster, and Shortcut Your Way to Success, a book that is "aimed at helping young people just starting their careers". [29] It was published in September 2016. [30]
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