Michael Serbinis

Michael Serbinis
Born	(1973-10-28) October 28, 1973
Nationality	Canadian
Alma mater	Queen’s University University of Toronto
Occupation(s)	Founder and CEO, The Everlong Project
Board member of	Round 13 Capital, Ontario Science Centre, Young Presidents’ Organization, OMERS Ventures, Xtreme Startups

Michael Serbinis is an entrepreneur, philanthropist and angel investor based in Toronto, Canada. Serbinis is the founder and CEO of LEAGUE INC., a digital health and wellness start-up. LEAGUE launched its free web and mobile apps on May 27, 2015. The marketplace gives consumers instant access to top-rated, verified health and wellness professionals and services.

Early life

Serbinis has an interest in science and technology and while in high school designed a high temperature superconductor propulsion system that won Gold at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, and subsequently led him to work with NASA, Rockwell Aerospace and Intel. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering Physics from Queen’s University, and a Masters of Science in Industrial Engineering from the University of Toronto.

Early in Serbinis’ career he developed Internet routing technology at Microsoft and search engine technology at Zip2, which had been founded by Elon Musk. Zip2 later was sold to the Altavista division of Compaq for roughly $300M.

Career

Serbinis founded and sold DocSpace for $568M in 2000 to Critical Path, when he was four years removed from his BASc. Critical Path was a global provider of messaging services that at one point ran one-third of the world’s email.

Serbinis was the co-founder and CEO of Kobo Inc., a global digital reading company. Kobo was founded in December 2009 as a spinoff from Canadian bookseller Indigo Books and Music. In its first year, Kobo drove $110M in sales and quickly became the only global competitor to Amazon Kindle. In 2012, Serbinis sold Kobo to Japanese electronic commerce and Internet company Rakuten for $315M. In 2014, Kobo reached 20 million users in 190 countries.

In August 2014, Serbinis partnered with Dan Galperin, Dan Leibu and Todd Humphrey in a secret project called Everlong. It appears that the Everlong Project spawned League Inc.

Philanthropy

Serbinis is the founder of Three Angels Capital and a G7 Fellow at the Creative Destruction Lab at Rotman School of Management. He is also a member of the Board of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, the Founder's Board at Round 13 Capital, and Board of Trustees at the Ontario Science Centre. Serbinis is also a member of the Young Presidents’ Organization. In 2013, Serbinis joined the OMERS Ventures advisory board to support entrepreneurs. In October 2015, Serbinis joined the Board of Directors at MaRS Discovery District.

External links

• "Kobo founder launches health-care start up". Toronto Star. 12 November 2014.
• "Kobo CEO Mike Serbinis talks tablets, Rakutan and more". Canadian Business. 6 September 2012.
• "Did Indigo Build Kobo, or Did Entrepreneur Mike Serbinis?". Tech Vibes. 9 November 2011.
• "$315-million Kobo takeover deal a windfall for Indigo". The Globe and Mail. 8 November 2011.
• "From Pinterest to Kobo, how Japan's Rakuten is building a global internet giant". Wired Magazine. 22 August 2012.
• "Ken Nickerson, Michael Serbinis, and Steven Woods Join OMERS Ventures Advisory Board". OMERS Venture. 5 February 2013.
• "Mike Serbinis Introduces Kobo's Fall Lineup". YouTube. 28 August 2013.
• "Kobo Founder and CEO Mike Serbinis at AccelerateTO!". C100. 18 September 2013.
• "SPOTLIGHT ON SCIENCE LEARNING: A benchmark of Canadian talent". Let's Talk Science.
• Michael Serbinis on Twitter