IDEALAB - Key Persons
Bill Gross founded Idealab in March 1996. Bill is a lifelong entrepreneur, starting his first solar business in high school. After graduating from the California Institute of Technology, Bill started GNP Development, Inc., which made a natural language product for Lotus 1-2-3 called HAL. In 1985, Lotus Development Corporation acquired GNP. In 1991, Bill started Knowledge Adventure, an educational software publisher that was eventually sold to Havas/Vivendi. Bill serves on the boards of directors of numerous companies and is also a member of the Board of Trustees of Caltech and the Art Center College of Design. Bill received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Caltech.
Gloria Hou joined Idealab in 2018. Prior to joining Idealab, she was the General Accounting Manager at Green Dot Corp. Gloria also previously worked at OneWest Bank as VP of Corporate Accounting, overseeing both General and Deposit Accounting departments. She is a CPA and received her B.A. in Economics from UCLA.
Jason Atzert joined the Design team at Idealab in 2004. Prior to that he worked in digital marketing, partnering with agencies including Saatchi & Saatchi and Chiat Day to build interactive media campaigns for Fortune 500 brands including Toyota, NBC, Disney, Microsoft and others. Jason received his B.S. in Biology from The Pennsylvania State University and his A.A. in Graphic Design from The Art Institute of Philadelphia.
Job Titles:
- Chief Executive Officer
- President
Marcia Goodstein founded Idealab with Bill Gross in March 1996 and is currently our Chief Executive Officer and President. Prior to founding Idealab, Marcia was an early employee of Gemstar Development Corporation and worked in a biology lab at the California Institute of Technology. She is a graduate of Pomona College.
Renée LaBran joined Idealab in 2015. Renée was a founding partner in Rustic Canyon Partners, a tech focused VC firm launched in 2000, and Rustic Canyon/Fontis Partners, a growth stage fund focused on consumer products. Prior to Rustic Canyon, Renée held a variety of executive management positions at the LA Times (including co-founder and CEO of CareerPath.com), and she was a management consultant with Monitor Company. She is a graduate of Harvard Business School and received her B.A. in Economics from UC Berkeley.
Stephanie Marquez joined Idealab in 1998. For more than two decades she has served in both administrative and management roles to keep the operations of Idealab and its many companies running smoothly and efficiently. Prior to joining Idealab, Stephanie worked in a variety of administrative positions in the accounting and public sectors.
Susan Aledort joined Idealab in 2007 and is now General Counsel to Idealab and Idealab Studio. Prior to joining Idealab, Susan was senior legal counsel at Epson America, Inc. Susan also previously worked in-house for a biotech company based in Vienna, Austria, and as a litigation associate at McDermott, Will and Emery. She graduated from Brown University, received her law degree from Georgetown, and is a member of the state bars in California and New York.
Job Titles:
- Vice President, Information Technologies
Tod Cole joined the Idealab team in 2024. Prior to that, he was the Director of Technical Operations at Heliogen. Tod also previously worked in technical operations at X1 Discovery, as Director of Engineering at a structural engineering firm, and as a junior officer in the U.S. Navy. Tod received his B.S. in Nuclear Engineering from UCSB.
Tom McGovern has served as Managing Director at Idealab since 2012. Prior to this current role, Tom held CEO positions with Idealab operating companies Snap, Perfect Market and Petsmart.com. Tom was previously at Warner Bros. where he was Senior Vice President of International Consumer Products. In 1996, Tom co-founded the Internet Mall, one of the Internet's earliest marketplaces which went public as Shopnow. Tom is a CPA, holds an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School and a B.S. from the University of Colorado.