Pierre Omidyar

Pierre Omidyar was born on June 21, 1967, in Paris, France, to parents from Iran; his father was a physician. He moved to the United States with his family at age six and grew up in the Washington, D.C., area.⁠[1][2]

He attended Punahou School in Hawaii for eighth and ninth grades, and graduated from Tufts University in 1988 with a degree in computer science.⁠[1]

After graduating, Omidyar developed Macintosh software at Claris, an AppleAppleApple is a public technology company founded in 1976 and headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Its business includes the iPhone, Mac, iPad, wearables, and services such as digital content, payments, and cloud storage. The company builds its product system through in-house hardware, operating systems, and services.Open the full entry subsidiary. In 1991 he co-founded Ink Development Corp., later renamed eShop Inc., which MicrosoftMicrosoftMicrosoft is a technology company founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975 and headquartered in Redmond, Washington, with businesses spanning Windows, Microsoft 365, Azure, enterprise software, artificial intelligence, gaming and devices.Open the full entry bought in 1996. In late 1994 he joined General Magic.⁠[1]

Over Labor Day weekend in 1995, Omidyar, then 28, launched AuctionWeb, an auction website he had coded himself, as a sole proprietorship; the first item sold on it was a broken laser pointer. He recalled, “I started it as an experiment, as a side hobby basically, while I had my day job.”⁠[1][2]

The site was renamed eBay in 1997; his first choice, Echo Bay, was already taken.⁠[1][2]

In 1998 Omidyar hired Meg Whitman as eBay’s chief executive, and eBay went public that fall; his stake made him a billionaire.⁠[1]

In 2004 Omidyar and his wife, Pam, founded Omidyar Network. ForbesForbesForbes is an American business media brand that began with Forbes magazine, founded by B.C. Forbes in 1917. It is known for rankings such as the Forbes 400, the World’s Billionaires list and 30 Under 30, and operates Forbes.com, ForbesLive events and licensed editions in 81 countries. Since 2014 a majority stake has been held by the Hong Kong investment group Integrated Whale Media; a 2021 plan to list on the New York Stock Exchange through a special purpose acquisition company was terminated in 2022. It is headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey.Open the full entry estimates the couple have put more than $1.5 billion through it into impact investments and nonprofits.⁠[1][2]

In 2005 the Omidyars gave $100 million to Tufts University to establish the Omidyar-Tufts Microfinance Fund.⁠[1]

From 2005 to 2020 Omidyar gave away at least 9.6 million eBay shares each year.⁠[2]

In September 2020 he stepped down from eBay’s board; he remained its largest single shareholder.⁠[1][2]

In 2006 the Omidyar family moved to Hawaii. He lives in Honolulu.⁠[1][2]

From 2010 Omidyar led the Hawaii news site Honolulu Civil Beat.⁠[1]

Omidyar announced First Look Media in 2013 and founded the news site The InterceptThe InterceptThe Intercept is a New York-based nonprofit investigative news outlet founded on February 10, 2014 by Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras and Jeremy Scahill under Pierre Omidyar’s First Look Media, initially to report on the NSA documents leaked by Edward Snowden; it became an independent nonprofit separate from First Look in 2023.Open the full entry in 2014. First Look Media is the parent company of The Intercept and the entertainment company Topic Studios.⁠[1][2]

Forbes’ real-time billionaires ranking estimated Omidyar’s net worth at $13.9 billion as of October 28, 2026, ranking him No. 218 in the world that day; Forbes lists the sources of his wealth as eBay and PayPalPayPalPayPal Holdings, Inc. (Nasdaq: PYPL) is an American digital payments company that operates payment brands including PayPal, Venmo, Braintree, and Xoom, providing online and in-store payments, money transfers, and consumer credit to consumers and merchants worldwide.Open the full entry and classifies him as self-made.⁠[2]

He also owns stakes in resort properties in California and Mexico and is developing real estate in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.⁠[2]

After eBay’s 1998 IPO, Omidyar and Pam set out to create positive social change; that work continues through a collection of mission-driven organizations they founded, known as the Omidyar Group, each independently led and guided by its own board, and the Omidyars are no longer involved in day-to-day operations.⁠[3]

The Omidyars pledged to give away all but 1 percent of their wealth within 20 years.⁠[1]

Omidyar Group: Official website: https://www.omidyargroup.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[3]