Yonatan Stern

Yonatan Stern
יונתן שטרן
Born1954 (age 71–72)
Israel
EducationTechnion – Israel Institute of Technology (BSE and MSc)
OccupationBusinessman
Years active1981–present
Children3

Yonatan Stern (Hebrew: יונתן שטרן) is an Israeli-American businessman. He is the founder of multiple companies, the most well known of them being ZoomInfo, a US data broker. He received a combined total of over a billion dollars via selling of some companies he founded.[1] He was awarded the Israel Defense Prize for contributions to the defense of the State of Israel.[2]

Early life

Stern was born in Jerusalem. His mother was a descendant of the Bak family, who moved to the land of Israel in the early nineteenth century and were part of the Old Yishuv. His father arrived in Mandatory Palestine after fleeing Czechoslovakia, following a pogrom that erupted in his hometown of Pezinok in 1939 in the lead up to the Holocaust.[3] He is one of three children.

His maternal grandfather is the Haredi artist Yitzhak Bak.[4]

Stern was in the first graduating class of Himmelfarb High School and then went on to graduate cum laude from the Technion,[5] with a bachelors (1976) and masters (1980) in computer science, working with Professor Shimon Even. He served in the Israeli Army, rising to the rank of Major in the Israeli Intelligence Corps.[2] While in the army he was awarded the Israel Defense Prize in recognition of projects accomplished by his unit - Unit 8200.

Career

Throughout Stern has founded numerous companies.[1] His served as the CEO for his first company, Rosh Intelligent Systems, a company providing software maintenance and diagnostic solutions.[1][6] Dan Tolkovsky was one of the first investors in the company.[7] Stern moved to Boston in 1989 to manage the Rosh headquarters there. Rosh (later renamed ServiceSoft) was sold to Broadbase Software in 2002.[8]

Stern left Rosh in 1993 to found Corex Technologies Inc. (later renamed to CardScan), a company selling business card scanners.[9] He served the role of CEO until 2006 when it was acquired by Dymo.[10]

In 2000, he founded Eliyon Technologies. It received investment from Venrock,[11] and later the company changed its name to Zoom Information Inc.[12] ZoomInfo is a data broker, and the company collects and sells personal data, both public and private, through various means of data and web scraping. Stern was the founder, CEO and Chief Scientist at ZoomInfo, and has six patents issued in his name. He developed most of the core technology that still runs the company.[13][14][15][16][17][18] In 2017 the company was sold to Great Hill Partners, a private equity firm for $240 million, with Stern staying on as CEO until July 2018, and remaining on the company's board.[19] Six months after leaving the CEO position, the company was sold to DiscoverOrg for $785 million,[20][21] who later adopted the ZoomInfo name and brand for the combined company.[22] As of 2026, ZoomInfo is the subject of numerous complaints and multiple lawsuits for illegally collecting and selling personal data without consent, misleading investors and artificially inflating its stock price.[23] Zoominfo is accused of "omitting truthful information about the company’s customer base, its subscription renewal practices, and other issues from SEC filings and related material" in the latter lawsuit.[24][25][26]

In 2008, Stern was a co-founder of Bizo, a spin-off from ZoomInfo.[27] The company provided business demographic data for online publishers.[28] Bizo was acquired by LinkedIn in 2014 for $175 million.[29]

After leaving ZoomInfo in 2018, Stern went on to found SmartUp Academy, a program dedicated to teaching entrepreneurs how to build profitable companies.[30] The Academy hosts lectures and workshops for entrepreneurs, CEOs and founders. The company also serves as a cofounder for many of the companies that it works with, focusing on growth and scale, and investing in them. Since 2020 Stern has invested in over a dozen companies[31], including Opster, which was sold to Elastic in 2023.[32][33] [34]

Awards and recognition

In 1980 Stern was awarded the Israel Defense Prize.[2][6]

Stern was nominated for the Ernst & Young's Young Entrepreneur of the Year award three times, in 1998, 1999 and 2001.[6]

In 2025 Stern gave a Tedx Talk at the Technion focusing on how to build a thriving company.[35]

References

  1. 1 2 3 "הישראלי שמכר שלושה סטארט־אפים ביותר ממיליארד דולר מסתער על חברה חדשה - ומגשים חלום". TheMarker. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  2. 1 2 3 Leichman, Abigail Klein (2017-10-15). "12 Israelis making a mark on Boston's tech scene". Israel21c. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  3. ↑ "Pezionk". www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  4. ↑ "עמוד הבית". יצחק ב"ק (in Hebrew). Retrieved 2025-12-08.
  5. ↑ "3 חברות, אדם 1 - אקזיט של מיליארד דולר". Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. Archived from the original on 2021-01-14. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  6. 1 2 3 "Jonathan Stern – Eliyon Technologies". The Wall Street Transcript. 2004-08-12. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  7. ↑ Ginosar, Ori (1987-07-15). "קבוצת משקיעים בראשות דן טולקובסקי רכשה 57% מחברת ראש מערכות חושבות". Maariv. Retrieved 2026-05-24.
  8. ↑ "Broadbase to acquire Servicesoft". CNET. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  9. ↑ "Corex Technologies changes identity to CardScan Inc". www.bizjournals.com. 2005-01-03. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  10. ↑ "How ZoomInfo's CEO sold three companies for $431M over 24 years". www.bizjournals.com. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  11. ↑ "ZoomInfo". Venrock. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  12. ↑ "Eliyon Technologies Corp changes name to Zoom Information Inc". www.onrec.com. 2005-03-22. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  13. ↑ 7356761, Karadimitriou, Kosmas; Stern, Jonathan & Decary, Michel et al., "Computer method and apparatus for determining content types of web pages", issued 2008-04-08
  14. ↑ 7065483, Decary, Michel; Stern, Jonathan & Karadimitriou, Kosmas et al., "Computer method and apparatus for extracting data from web pages", issued 2006-06-20
  15. ↑ 7054886, Stern, Jonathan; Rothman-shore, Jeremy W. & Karadimitriou, Kosmas et al., "Method for maintaining people and organization information", issued 2006-05-30
  16. ↑ 6983282, Stern, Jonathan; Karadimitriou, Kosmas & Rothman-shore, Jeremy W. et al., "Computer method and apparatus for collecting people and organization information from Web sites", issued 2006-01-03
  17. ↑ 6778986, Stern, Jonathan; Karadimitriou, Kosmas & Decary, Michel et al., "Computer method and apparatus for determining site type of a web site", issued 2004-08-17
  18. ↑ 6618717, Karadimitriou, Kosmas; Stern, Jonathan & Decary, Michel et al., "Computer method and apparatus for determining content owner of a website", issued 2003-09-09
  19. ↑ "B2B data platform ZoomInfo was acquired by private equity firm Great Hill Partners for $240 million". VentureBeat. 2017-08-17. Archived from the original on 2022-07-01. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  20. ↑ "קרן גריט היל מוכרת את זום-אינפו הישראלית ב-800 מיליון דולר". TheMarker. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  21. ↑ "חברת ZoomInfo שייסד הישראלי יונתן שטרן מגייסת 800 מיליון דולר בנאסד"ק". calcalist. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  22. ↑ "DiscoverOrg Rebrands As ZoomInfo, Offers New B2B Data Platform". www.mediapost.com. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  23. ↑ Sheth, Sheryl (2024-10-24). "Class Action Lawsuit Against ZoomInfo Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:ZI)". Nasdaq. Retrieved 2025-10-02. A class action lawsuit was filed against [ZoomInfo on] September 4, 2024 [.] According to the lawsuit, ZoomInfo and two of its senior [directors] repeatedly made false and misleading public statements [... particularly,] they are accused of omitting truthful information about the company's customer base, its subscription renewal practices, and other issues from SEC filings and related material.
  24. ↑ Burda, Douglas (2025-01-29). "Unraveling the ZoomInfo Class Action Lawsuit: What You Need to Know". Ultra Law. Retrieved 2025-10-02.
  25. ↑ Brown, Christopher (2024-09-06). "ZoomInfo Sued Again for Use of Personal Info to Promote Services". Bloomberg Law. Retrieved 2025-10-02. ZoomInfo Technologies LLC is facing a proposed class action alleging it misappropriated the personal information of consumers to sell its services in violation of the Washington Personality Rights Act. [The plaintiff] alleged [the company to have] used her name and personal information to advertise and promote its products and services without her consent despite the fact that she never interacted with the company. [The] lawsuit comes two months after the company agreed to pay $30 million to settle a similar lawsuit from residents of California, Illinois, Indiana, and Nevada, Ramos v. ZoomInfo Techs. LLC.
  26. ↑ Bourgeois, Michaela (7 July 2026). "'The truth emerges': Vancouver-based ZoomInfo faces class action suit from investors". KOIN. Retrieved 8 July 2026.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  27. ↑ פרג, נועה (2009-11-28). "ממוקדת משקיעים: חברת הסטארט-אפ Bizo גייסה 6 מיליון דולר". Globes. Retrieved 2026-05-24.
  28. ↑ "Bizo". Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  29. ↑ "LinkedIn Will Acquire Business Marketing Company Bizo For $175M". TechCrunch. 22 July 2014. Retrieved 2020-06-26.
  30. ↑ "21 מיליון שקל לעשור: החברות ששוכרות באינפיניטי פארק נחשפות". Ice (in Hebrew). 2023-08-27. Retrieved 2026-05-24.
  31. ↑ "Companies". Smart Up. Retrieved 2026-05-24.
  32. ↑ "opster website". opster.com. Retrieved 2022-06-30.
  33. ↑ Exner, ByKen. "Elastic and Opster join forces to help users take charge of their search operations". Elastic Blog. Retrieved 2026-05-24.
  34. ↑ "Opster raises $5 million to manage enterprise search engines and databases". ctech. 2022-07-04. Retrieved 2026-05-24.
  35. ↑ TEDx Talks (2026-02-13). Building a Thriving Hi-Tech Company is Easier Than You Think | Yonatan Stern | TEDxTechnion. Retrieved 2026-05-24 – via YouTube.
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