Mark Cuban

Mark Cuban was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up in the suburb of Mt. Lebanon, displaying an early entrepreneurial spirit. At age 12, he sold garbage bags door-to-door, and later ran newspapers during a strike, honing his business acumen. After graduating from Indiana University's Kelley School of Business—where he briefly owned a popular bar—he moved to Dallas, Texas. There, after being fired from a software sales job for prioritizing a sale over cleaning duties, he founded MicroSolutions in the early 1980s, an IT consulting firm specializing in systems integration, software installation, networking, and technologies like Carbon Copy, Lotus Notes, and CompuServe. The company grew to nearly $36 million in annualized sales with 80 employees and no losing months before Cuban sold it to CompuServe (a subsidiary of H&R Block) in 1990 for $6 million, netting him about $2 million after taxes. Post-sale, Cuban briefly 'retired' to invest in public and private companies, achieving 80%+ annual returns and even building a short-lived hedge fund that he sold within a year. In 1995, frustrated by inability to stream Indiana basketball games online, he co-founded AudioNet (later Broadcast.com) with Todd Wagner, pioneering live internet audio and video streaming. The company exploded with the dot-com boom and was acquired by Yahoo! in 1999 for $5.7 billion in stock, making Cuban a billionaire at age 40. He then founded Radical Computing, Inc., a venture capital firm, and pursued acting classes in Los Angeles before returning to Dallas. In 2000, Cuban purchased the struggling NBA franchise Dallas Mavericks for $285 million (now valued much higher), transforming it into a contender, including a 2011 NBA Championship. He launched media ventures like AXS TV and HDNet, invested in startups (e.g., $1.7 million in Red Swoosh, sold for $19 million), and exposed market fraud via Sharesleuth. Since 2011, he has been a prominent 'Shark' on Shark Tank, investing millions in hundreds of startups across tech, food, and sustainability, earning nine Emmy nominations and a 2024 win as Executive Producer. Cuban co-founded Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company to combat high drug prices, established The Mark Cuban Foundation for AI bootcamps and community support (e.g., funding Dallas's St. Patrick's Day Parade), and authored How to Win at the Sport of Business (2013). He lives in Dallas with wife Tiffany and children Alexis, Alyssa, and Jake.