| Jared Hecht | |
| Birth Date: | , March 11th[1] |
| Nationality: | American |
| Occupation: | Businessman |
| Alma Mater: | Columbia University |
| Known For: | Founder of Fundera, Co-founder of GroupMe |
Jared Hecht is an American entrepreneur, and the co-founder and CEO of Fundera, an online small business lending aggregator as well as group messaging app GroupMe.[2]
Hecht studied political science at Columbia University, where he received his bachelor's degree in 2009.[3] While a student at Columbia, he was the managing director and publisher for the university's student-written guidebook, Inside New York.[4]
Hecht was an early employee at Tumblr and led business development.[5] [6] In 2010, Hecht co-founded group messaging app, GroupMe, which allows users to create a private group to which they can send text messages or make conference calls, with his friend Steve Martocci, founder of Blade and Splice who was then a software engineer with Gilt Groupe. They won the South by Southwest breakout ward in 2011. The two raised $11 million from Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst in 2011.[7] After being live for 370 days, Microsoft purchased GroupMe for $80 million.[8]
One of Hecht's early hires at GroupMe, Zach Sims, also a Columbia alumnus, went on to found the online code-learning platform Codecademy.[9]
Hecht later became an angel investor and invested in companies such as Sweetgreen, TransferWise, and Flatiron Health.[10] [11] In October 2013, he launched Fundera, an online broker that helps small businesses get loans from non-bank lenders, after seeing a family member struggle with bank loans, and raised a total of $18.9 million for his platform from investors such as Khosla Ventures, First Round Capital, David Tisch, and more.[12] [13] A year since it was launched, the company has secured more than $60 million in credit for 1,200 small-business owners.[14]
In 2015, he was named in Forbes "30 under 30" list for the Consumer Tech category.[15]
He is married to Carrie Weprin, a film producer, and the couple live in Brooklyn with their two children.[16] [17]