Bazaarvoice, the leader in social commerce solutions that drive sales, today announced that Founder and CEO Brett Hurt is a finalist for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year ® 2009 Award in Austin. According to Ernst & Young LLP, the awards program recognizes entrepreneurs who demonstrate extraordinary success in the areas of innovation, financial performance, and personal commitment to their businesses and communities. Hurt was selected as a finalist by a panel of independent judges, and award winners will be announced at a special gala event on Thursday, May 28 at the Hilton Austin Downtown.
“The entrepreneurial spirit was part of my earliest family life, and it has guided every major choice I have made as an adult,” said Hurt. “I’m very honored and humbled to be recognized by Ernst & Young, the judges, and Austin community in this way, and I’m pleased to share this nomination with my family, colleagues, and clients at Bazaarvoice who inspire me every day.”
Hurt is a seasoned executive who is widely recognized for turning groundbreaking ideas into leading businesses. He founded Bazaarvoice four years ago with the vision of bringing “the voice of the open marketplace” to multichannel companies. Under his leadership, Bazaarvoice has grown to serve over 50 billion user-generated product Answers, Stories, and Ratings & Reviews through its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform. Today, 525 leading brands in 15 industries and 21 languages use Bazaarvoice to deliver the best shopping experience across all channels and bring the authentic voice of the customer into their organizations to create better products, services, and business processes.
Prior to Bazaarvoice, Hurt founded Coremetrics and helped grow the company into the leading marketing analytics solution for the eCommerce industry, servicing more than 1,900 brands globally today. He was previously the founder and CEO of Hurt Technology Consulting and BodyMatrix, an online retailer of sports nutrition products, which he sold. Before that, he was a consultant at Deloitte Consulting and Andersen Consulting (now Accenture). Hurt holds an MBA in High-Tech Entrepreneurship from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a BBA in Management Information Systems from the University of Texas at Austin.
Hurt serves on the Board of Directors of Shop.org , the leading non-profit industry association for retailers online and a division of the National Retail Federation , the largest trade organization for retailers. He also serves as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the Wharton School . Brett actively advises several early-stage technology companies. He is an inventor ( US Patent #7,050,989 ) and a regular speaker at industry events and universities.
“Brett is a true entrepreneur with the uncanny ability to understand where the market is headed,” said Chris Pacitti, General Partner at Austin Ventures. “He also has the courage to follow his vision and the ability to rally resources and people behind him. As Bazaarvoice has grown, I’ve continued to be impressed with the way that Brett has evolved the company while creating a strong corporate culture that drives success.”
The Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year awards program celebrates its 23 rd anniversary this year. The program has expanded to recognize business leaders in over 135 cities in 50 countries throughout the world. Regional award winners are eligible for consideration for the Ernst & Young LLP Entrepreneur Of The Year national program. Award winners in several national categories, as well as the overall national Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year award winner, will be announced at the annual awards gala in Palm Springs, California on November 14, 2009. The awards are the culminating event of the Ernst & Young Strategic Growth Forum, the nation’s most prestigious gathering of high-growth, market-leading companies.
About Bazaarvoice
Bazaarvoice’s Software as a Service (SaaS) social commerce solutions have served more than 50 billion pieces of customer-generated content on more than 525 brand web sites like Best Buy , Costco , Dell , Macy’s , Overstock , P&G , Panasonic , and QVC in 36 countries. The company connects organizations to their influencers through a unique network that reaches hundreds of millions of consumers around the globe, enabling authentic customer-powered marketing. Through syndication, analytics, partnerships, and consulting, Bazaarvoice brings the voice of the customer to the center of their clients’ business strategy, proving “social” can drive measured revenue growth and cost savings for manufacturing, retail, travel, and financial services companies. Headquartered in Austin, the company has offices in London, Paris, and Singapore. For more information and access to client success stories, visit www.bazaarvoice.com , read the blog at www.bazaarblog.com , and follow on Twitter at www.twitter.com/bazaarvoice .