Jump to content

Lawrence Ng (entrepreneur)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lawrence Ng
Photo of Lawrence Ng
Born (1978-11-09) 9 November 1978 (age 45)
NationalityAmerican
EducationPace University
University of Southern California (BA)
Occupations
  • Entrepreneur
  • philanthropist
Years active2000–present

Lawrence Ng is an entrepreneur and business executive, best known as the co-founder and former CEO of Oversee.net, a 2000s-era company that specialized in domain services and internet marketing services.

Early life and ownership of Oversee.net

[edit]

Ng immigrated from Hong Kong at the age of 3 and was raised in New York City. He grew up in relative poverty and was homeless until the age of 5. He recounted in a 2023 interview that he worked more than a dozen jobs before he turned 18 to make ends meet.[1]

He was admitted to Pace University in 1996, and later transferred to the University of Southern California, where he received a degree in business. In 1999, shortly after graduating, he began his career at a company called Startpath, a traditional ad network. It was here that he met his future business partner, Fred Hsu. Following the end of the dot-com bubble in 2000, Startpath went under, and Hsu and Ng jointly launched Oversee.net.[2] Among other ventures, the company was engaged in domain name trading.

The company initially had modest revenue, but grew quickly. By 2006, Oversee.net owned around half of a million websites and its yearly revenues exceeded $100 million.[3] In early 2007, Ernst & Young named Ng as one of the finalists for their 2007 Entrepreneur of the Year Award in the Greater Los Angeles area,[4] and one year later, the New York Times listed Oversee.net as one of the largest companies in the domain name trading space, along with Demand Media.[5] Oversee.net was also named to the Inc. 500 list, which catalogues the fastest-growing companies in the US, and received several other awards as well.[6]

Charity work and startup incubation

[edit]

In 2009, Ng liquidated his interest in Oversee.net and launched The Lawrence C Ng Family Foundation, which is dedicated to funding non-profit organizations that provide education and career guidance to underprivileged children.[6][7]

Ng also became active in the angel investing and startup incubation spaces. In 2015, he joined the advisory board of Metamorphic Ventures, a New York City-based venture capital firm,[6] and later that year, financial media outlets reported that he had launched the Onramp Fund, a startup incubator.[8]

Onramp subsequently invested in several businesses. These included Simply Bridal, a wedding dress company, and KidGuard, a parental monitoring app for iOS and Android smartphones.[9] Following KidGuard's launch, it became the subject of significant media attention and attracted both praise and controversy.[10][11]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Lawrence Ng and the History of SideHustles.com". SideHustles.com. August 16, 2023. Retrieved August 28, 2023.
  2. ^ "Interview with Lawrence Ng, Founder, Oversee.net". socalTECH. February 20, 2007. Retrieved July 11, 2023.
  3. ^ Flanigan, James (October 19, 2006). "Making Money by Matching Surfers to Marketers". New York Times. Retrieved July 11, 2023.
  4. ^ "Finalists for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year(R)". Bloomberg Media. May 18, 2007. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  5. ^ Stone, Brad (February 1, 2008). "Coins in the New Realm". New York Times. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  6. ^ a b c "Lawrence Ng of LNG Management Joins Metamorphic Ventures Advisory Board". Business Wire. October 6, 2015. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  7. ^ Smith, Spectacular (December 6, 2017). "This CEO Built a $200 Million Empire Before He Turned 30. Here Are His 7 Tips for Starting a Business". Inc. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  8. ^ "Oversee.net Co-Founder Lawrence Ng Launches Incubator". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  9. ^ "美國創投公司 Onramp Lab 研發監測軟體 Kidguard,突破隱私與安全兩難,守護孩子遠離霸凌". TechNews 科技新報 (in Chinese (Taiwan)). Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  10. ^ Mucklai, Shazir (April 4, 2017). "New Startup KidGuard, Attempts to Revolutionize Phone Monitoring for Kids". Inc. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
  11. ^ Valentino-Devries, Jennifer (19 May 2018). "Hundreds of Apps Can Empower Stalkers to Track Their Victims". The New York Times. Retrieved 11 July 2023.
[edit]