Alex Zoghlin, 30, founder of two highly successful Internet startups, has been named chief technology officer of the consumer-oriented travel industry portal being developed by United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Northwest Airlines and Continental Airlines, the new web company announced today.
As the founder of Internet retailer Sportsgear LLC and web site development firm Neoglyphics Media Corporation (NMC), Alex is recognized as one of the Internet’s most influential web site developers. He is well-known and respected throughout the technology industry for developing exciting, cutting-edge, and easy-to-use sites.
In 1995, Zoghlin founded and served as Chief Executive officer of Neoglyphics Media Corporation. Under Zoghlin’s leadership, Neoglyphic’s clients included the likes of Amazon.com, Travelocity, General Motors, and Sears, among others. Before selling the company in 1997, he grew NMC from a small start-up to a staff of more than 150 employees in three countries. During that same period, NMC’s revenue grew more than twenty-five fold.
In 1997, Fortune profiled Zoghlin and named NMC one of its 25 Cool Companies of the year. In 1996, Inter@ctive Week named him to its Honor Roll of the most influential people on the Internet.
The new site, scheduled to launch later this year, promises to make it easier for consumers to shop for and book travel on-line. The site will offer consumers one-stop-shopping with a complete selection of products and services from more than 455 air carriers, 200 hotel companies (approximately 39,000 properties), 44 car rental companies, and a large number of cruise lines, vacation packagers and other travel suppliers worldwide. In addition, the new travel portal will offer the most comprehensive collection of airline Internet-only fares.
“Shopping for and buying travel is one of the most complex transactions a consumer can make on-line,” Zoghlin said. “My goal is to make it easy and fast, with the best fares so our customers will never need to go anyplace else.”
Zoghlin also acted as an analyst for a prominent Silicon Valley venture capital firm. He provided information technology, due diligence and analysis for potential investment candidates.
Zoghlin attended the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign, studying Statistical Economics and Asian Studies. While at Illinois, he was a member of the Mosaic development team at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, helping develop the first Internet web server. Alex specialized in encryption and was one of the original developers of the security protocols used by both Netscape and Microsoft.
Prior to attending University of Illinois, Zoghlin served for eight years in the United States Navy (four active and four reserve) as an encryption specialist.
Zoghlin speaks and writes Mandarin, is a master scuba diver, a licensed pilot and a black belt in Tae Kwon Do.
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