Blog Post

The Argentine-born entrepreneur grew up in an apartment on Avenida Las Heras in Buenos Aires and moved to the United States when he was in his teens. After graduating from New York University and Columbia University he launched 15 businesses, grew five into unicorns and revolutionised everything from telecoms to fertility. His latest start-up, Prelude Fertility, has a bold plan to turn the infertility industry on its head. Varsavsky isn’t just a serial entrepreneur; he’s also a family man, with seven children and a wife expecting their eighth. Find out

On a sunny weekend in early May, on the Spanish island of Menorca, Varsavsky hosted two dozen high-tech mavens for a networking session. They boated, biked and raced all-terrain vehicles on a 800-acre farm by the sea.

It was one of many meetings he holds each year to make small bets on upstarts in which he’s invested or might invest next. He typically puts his money into firms in their earliest, riskiest stages. His first investment was in Fon, an outfit with an ambitious plan to create a network of “Foneros” who share their Wi-Fi connections with each other around the world. He also has backed companies like Joost, the online video service run by Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, who founded the file-sharing service Kazaa and the Skype Internet phone service that Ebay bought for $2.6 billion in 2005.

I interviewed Varsavsky in London last week, after he had hosted a meeting of his investment group for Dopplr, the social travel network. He and I talked about the company, its business model (or lack thereof) and traveling in general. We discussed some of the controversy surrounding his blogging, as well, including accusations that he ignores comments or deletes them.