Career
Bell founded the web hosting company that eventually became Globix Corporation in 1989 at the age of 21 [7] and served as its CEO and chairman of the board through the company's IPO in 1996 [8] and into the dot-com bubble; as the company crashed along with the stock market in 2001 as its main internet data centers were located in lower Manhattan, [9] Bell as board chairman moved Peter Stevenson into the CEO role. [10] Its market capitalization fell from almost $2.4 billion [11] in 1999 to $5.87 million in 2002 when it went through Chapter 11 bankruptcy due to its inability to recover from the September 11, 2001 attack. [12] [13]
In 2001, he joined the Board of Trustees of New York University and Board of Overseers New York University School of Medicine. [6] [14]
Through his company Marc Bell Capital, Bell is an investor and partner in restaurants and nightclubs in New York City in ventures such as Artichoke Pizza and Lavo. [6] [7]
In 2004, Bell and a partner acquired Penthouse magazine for $52 million in a bankruptcy auction through a vehicle they called "Penthouse Media Group", [6] [15] [16] and in 2007 Penthouse Media Group acquired Various, which included networking site AdultFriendFinder.com for $500 million [6] and Bell and his partner renamed the company Friend Finder Networks. [16] In the 2008 Bell attempted to enter the Las Vegas casino market and was interviewed by Robin Leach about his intentions; he brought Penthouse models with him to the interview. [17]
Bell has produced musicals and plays such as Jersey Boys, Rock of Ages, The Wedding Singer, August: Osage County, and A Catered Affair. [7] His production Jersey Boys won a Tony Award for Best Musical in 2006 and August: Osage County won Best Play in 2008. [18] Jersey Boys was the eighth highest grossing show in the history of Broadway with worldwide revenue of $1,644,848,098. [19] [20] Bell also won a Tony Award for Best Play in 2024 for Stereophonic (play) [21]
In 2007 Bell filed a SPAC with the SEC for $250 million called Enterprise Acquisition Corp. [22] In 2009 it merged with Armour Residential REIT [23] In 2024 Armour was worth $1.3 billion with over $13 billion of assets [24]
In 2010 Bell, through Friend Finder Networks, tried to acquire Playboy Enterprises but was rebuffed after a $210 million bid. [6] [25]
The Friend Finder Networks company and the Penthouse magazine that it owned filed for bankruptcy protection on September 17, 2013. FriendFinder’s current common stock was wiped out and was no longer traded on the open market. In August 2013, FriendFinder's stock was delisted from Nasdaq because it consistently failed to trade for more than $1. [26] [16]
In 2013 Bell created The Boca Raton Police Foundation. [27] He later retired as chairman in 2024. [28]
Bell put his house in Boca Raton on the market for $35 million; it included a room modeled after the bridge of the Enterprise D from Star Trek: The Next Generation. [29] The listing was removed in May, 2019. [30] CNBC did a special on the house in 2014. [31]
On September 13, 2017, Bell took in 70 foster kids who were displaced during a Hurricane Irma from local shelters. [32] [33] [34]
He is a co-founder and the chief executive officer for Terran Orbital, a manufacturer of small satellites. [35] [36] Terran Orbital received $100 million investment from Lockheed Martin [37] Terran added a satellite to the permanent display of the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in March 2023 [38]
On August 15th, 2024, Bell agreed to sell Terran Orbital to Lockheed Martin for $450 million which was 25 cents per share, [39] resulting in a massive hit to shareholders [40] and a 6-million-dollar bonus for himself. [41] At the end of October 2024, Lockheed Martin completed its acquisition of Terran Orbital, becoming the sole owner of the company. Terran Orbital continues its existence as part of Lockheed Martin (rebranded as “Terran Orbital, a Lockheed Martin Company”) and continues to produce smallsats. [42]
Iridium Communications Inc. is a publicly traded American company headquartered in McLean, Virginia, United States. Iridium operates the Iridium satellite constellation, a system of 80 satellites: 66 are active satellites and the remaining fourteen function as in-orbit spares. Iridium Satellites are used for worldwide voice and data communication from handheld satellite phones, satellite messenger communication devices and integrated transceivers, as well as for two-way satellite messaging service from supported conventional mobile phones. The nearly polar orbit and communication between satellites via inter-satellite links provide global service availability.
The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American defense and aerospace manufacturer with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It is headquartered in North Bethesda, Maryland. As of January 2022, Lockheed Martin employs approximately 115,000 employees worldwide, including about 60,000 engineers and scientists. Reports from 2024 estimate that Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMT) holds a market cap of around $139.7 billion.
Penthouse is a men's magazine founded by Bob Guccione and published by Los Angeles–based Penthouse World Media, LLC. It combines urban lifestyle articles and softcore pornographic pictures of women that, in the 1990s, evolved into hardcore pornographic pictures of women.
Globalstar, Inc. is an American telecommunications company that operates a satellite constellation in low Earth orbit (LEO) for satellite phone, low-speed data transmission and earth observation. The Globalstar second-generation constellation consists of 25 satellites.
TheBoca Raton is a luxury resort and club in Boca Raton, Florida, founded in 1926, today comprising 1,047 hotel rooms across 337 acres. Its facilities include a 18-hole golf course, a 50,000 sq. ft. Forbes Five-Star spa, eight swimming pools, 30 tennis courts, a full-service 32-slip marina, more than 15 restaurants and bars, and 200,000 sq. ft. of meeting space. The property fronts both Lake Boca and the Atlantic Ocean. The resort was operated as part of Hilton's Waldorf Astoria Hotels and Resorts, and it is now privately owned by an affiliate of MSD Partners with the new name, The Boca Raton.
Adult FriendFinder(AFF) is an internet-based, adult-oriented social networking service, online dating service and swinger personals community website, founded by Andrew Conru in 1996.
Friend Finder Networks is an American internet company founded in 1996 by Andrew Conru and Lars Mapstead. Its corporate headquarters are located in Boca Raton, Florida, with additional offices in California, New York, and Taiwan.
GeoEye Inc. was an American commercial satellite imagery company based in Herndon, Virginia. GeoEye was merged into the DigitalGlobe corporation on January 29, 2013.
SkyTerra (SKYT), formerly Mobile Satellite Ventures, was a Reston, Virginia company that developed telecommunications systems that integrate satellite and terrestrial radio communication technologies into one system. In March 2010, the company was acquired by Harbinger Capital Partners and under the leadership of CEO Sanjiv Ahuja became part of a new company called LightSquared. The company placed its first satellite, SkyTerra-1, in orbit on November 14, 2010. LightSquared has since then went bankrupt and emerged from bankruptcy as Ligado Networks.
The Iridium satellite constellation provides L band voice and data information coverage to satellite phones, satellite messenger communication devices and integrated transceivers. Iridium Communications owns and operates the constellation, additionally selling equipment and access to its services. It was conceived by Bary Bertiger, Raymond J. Leopold and Ken Peterson in late 1987 and then developed by Motorola on a fixed-price contract from July 29, 1993, to November 1, 1998, when the system became operational and commercially available.
NewSat was an independent satellite communications provider in Australia. Its satellites, VSATs and teleports provided coverage of 75% of the Earth’s surface. NewSat was founded on 28 March 1987, then named as Yalfaga. Its name was later changed to Browns Creek Gold and then Australian Environmental Resources. In 1999, the company was purchased by NewSat's CEO, Adrian Ballintine, and renamed MultiEmedia.com. With the help of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen owning 3% and Steve Vizard on the board, it became a profitable web development company, developing the websites for Thrifty Car Rental, Hamilton Island and Nissan Australia. It also sold its own in-house products, such as ZoneStudio, a web development tool, and IntraZone, an early SharePoint-like intranet application.
Andrew Conru is an American internet businessman who has founded e-commerce, advertising, online dating, and personal ad sites including W3, AdKnowledge, WebPersonals, FriendFinder, and Adult FriendFinder. He is the CEO of FriendFinder Networks Inc.
Space launch market competition is the manifestation of market forces in the launch service provider business. In particular it is the trend of competitive dynamics among payload transport capabilities at diverse prices having a greater influence on launch purchasing than the traditional political considerations of country of manufacture or the national entity using, regulating or licensing the launch service.
Chris Hollod is a venture capitalist, angel investor, and advisor in Los Angeles. Hollod was the co-founder and chief executive officer of Tailwind Acquisition Corp. which merged with Terran Orbital in March 2022 in a $1.8 billion deal. Over the course of his career, Hollod has completed more than 150 deals across five different investment entities, including investments in Uber, Airbnb, Houzz, Spotify, Pinterest, Duolingo, Airtable, Oscar Health, Flexport, Casper, and Warby Parker.
Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems was an American company that designed and built satellites. It started as a designer, builder and provider of nanosatellite and CubeSat space vehicle products and services for government and commercial customers. Tyvak was based in Irvine, California. It was a subsidiary of Terran Orbital Corporation. In 2022, it was announced that Tyvak would transition into larger satellites from nanosats and cubesats and the name Tyvak would be phased out in favor of the name of the parent company Terran Orbital.
Vector Launch, Inc. is an American space technology company which aims to launch suborbital and orbital payloads. Vector Launch declared bankruptcy in December 2019 and re-emerged in October 2020.
GPS Block IIIF, or GPS III Follow On (GPS IIIF), is the second set of GPS Block III satellites, consisting of up to 22 space vehicles. The United States Air Force began the GPS Block IIIF acquisition effort in 2016. On 14 September 2018, a manufacturing contract with options worth up to $7.2 billion was awarded to Lockheed Martin. The 22 satellites in Block IIIF are projected to start launching in 2027, with launches estimated to last through at least 2037.
Relativity Space Inc. is an American aerospace manufacturing company headquartered in Long Beach, California. Relativity Space is developing manufacturing technologies, launch vehicles, and rocket engines for commercial orbital launch services. The company is notable for manufacturing most of their Terran 1 and Terran R rocket parts using 3D printing. As of April 2024, Terran R is on track for initial launch in 2026.
Orbital Express Launch Ltd., or Orbex, is a United Kingdom-based aerospace company that is developing a small commercial orbital rocket called Prime. Orbex is headquartered in Forres, Moray, in Scotland and has subsidiaries in Denmark and Germany. Orbex may build its future launch complex, Sutherland spaceport, on the A' Mhòine peninsula in the county of Sutherland, northern Scotland, if and when deemed necessary.
Orbital Insight is a Palo Alto, California-based geospatial analytics company. The company analyzes satellite, drone, balloon and other unmanned aerial vehicle images, including cell phone geolocation data, to study a range of human activity, and provides business and other strategic insights from the data.
