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Divya Narendra

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Divya Narendra
Divya Narendra
Narendra in 2011
Born (1982-03-18) March 18, 1982 (age 42)
The Bronx, New York, U.S.
Alma materHarvard University (AB)
Northwestern University (JD-MBA)
OccupationBusinessman
Known forConnectU
SpousePhoebe White

Divya Narendra (/nəˈrɛndrə/; born March 18, 1982) is an American businessman. He is the CEO and co-founder of SumZero along with Harvard classmate Aalap Mahadevia. He also co-founded HarvardConnection (later renamed ConnectU) with Harvard University classmates Cameron Winklevoss and Tyler Winklevoss.

Early life and education

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Divya Narendra was born in the Bronx, New York and raised in Bayside, Queens, the eldest son of immigrant doctors from India, Sudhanshu Narendra and Dharamjit Narendra Kumar, of Sands Point, New York.[1][2][3] Narendra graduated from Townsend Harris High School in Kew Gardens Hills, Queens before attending Harvard University in 2000, from which he graduated in applied mathematics in 2004.[1][4][5]

SumZero

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SumZero is an investment community founded by Divya Narendra and Aalap Mahadevia.[6]

ConnectU

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Main article: ConnectU

ConnectU (originally Harvard Connection) was a social networking website launched on May 21, 2004,[7] that was founded by Harvard students Cameron Winklevoss, Tyler Winklevoss, and Narendra in December 2002.[8] Users could add people as friends, send them messages, and update their personal profiles to notify friends about themselves.[9][10] In November 2003, the Winklevosses and Narendra approached Mark Zuckerberg about joining the HarvardConnection team. Zuckerberg later founded Facebook, leading to several lawsuits.

On February 6, 2004, the Winklevosses and Narendra first learned of thefacebook.com while reading a press release in the Harvard student newspaper The Harvard Crimson.[11] According to Victor Gao, who looked at the HarvardConnection code afterward, Zuckerberg had left the HarvardConnection code incomplete and non-functional, with a registration that did not connect with the back-end connections.[10] On February 10, 2004, the Winklevosses and Narendra sent Zuckerberg a cease and desist letter.[12] They also asked the Harvard administration to act on what they viewed as a violation of the university’s honor code and student handbook.[13] They lodged a complaint with the Harvard Administrative Board and university president Larry Summers; however, both viewed the matter to be outside the university's jurisdiction.[14] President Summers advised the HarvardConnection team to take their matter to the courts.[15]

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Narendra is portrayed by Max Minghella in The Social Network (2010), a film directed by David Fincher about the founding of Facebook. Narendra is of Indian ancestry, while Minghella is of Italian and Chinese ancestry. Narendra said that he was "initially surprised" to see himself portrayed by a non-Indian actor but also said that "Max did a good job in pushing the dialogue forward and creating a sense of urgency in what was a very frustrating period."[16]

References

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  1. ^ a b Chhabra, Aseem (2010-10-15). "Facebook Wars: Facebook was his idea!". Bangladesh Abroad.
  2. ^ "Phoebe White, Divya Narendra". The New York Times. 2017-06-18. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
  3. ^ Ravindran, Shruti (2010-10-10). "Facebooked". bazpur, uttrakhand, Indian Express.
  4. ^ Fowler, Geoffrey (2010-10-11). "Creative license of 'Social Network'". Wall Street Journal.
  5. ^ "Divya LinkedIn".
  6. ^ "Interview with Divya Narendra, CEO of SumZero". Archived from the original on 2010-06-17. Retrieved 2010-07-27.
  7. ^ Bombardieri, Marcella (2004-09-17). "Online Adversaries: Rivalry between college-networking websites spawns lawsuit". The Boston Globe.
  8. ^ Pontin, Jason (2007-08-12). "Who owns the concept if no one signs the papers?". The New York Times.
  9. ^ Cassidy, John (2006-05-15). "Me Media: How hanging out on the Internet became big business". The New Yorker.
  10. ^ a b McGinn, Timothy (2004-05-28). "Online facebooks duel over tangled web of authorship". The Harvard Crimson.
  11. ^ O'Brien, Luke (2007-12-03). "Polking Facebook". 02138 Magazine.
  12. ^ Glenn, Malcolm (2007-07-27). "For now, Facebook foes continue fight against site". The Harvard Crimson.
  13. ^ Hale, David (2004-10-06). "Facebook faces litigation over design concept". The Daily Orange. Archived from the original on 2010-11-20.
  14. ^ Sharif, Shirin (2004-08-05). "Harvard grads face off against thefacebook.com". The Stanford Daily. Archived from the original on 2010-06-18.
  15. ^ Maugeri, Alexander (2004-09-20). "TheFacebook.com faces lawsuit". The Daily Princetonian. Archived from the original on 2012-07-24. Retrieved 2010-10-04.
  16. ^ Divya Narendra on being a Wildcat, The Social Network and his suit against Facebook Archived 2010-11-15 at the Wayback Machine. North by Northwestern. Retrieved on 2012-09-16.
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