Jon Fisher

Early life and education

Fisher was born at Stanford Hospital to university professors Gerald and Anita Fisher. His father is a noted nuclear physicist at Stanford, who worked with Nobel laureates such as Arthur Schawlow, Robert Hofstadter and Felix Bloch. Fisher graduated from The Nueva School and Crystal Springs Uplands School, and attended Vassar College before graduating from the University of San Francisco.

Career

In 1994, Fisher cofounded and was Chief Executive Officer of AutoReach, now an AutoNation company. Former Oracle President and recent Hewlett Packard chairman Ray Lane was Fisher's first angel investor and also invested in two of Fisher's later start ups. In 1998, Fisher was the co-founder and CEO of the business software company, NetClerk, Inc., now part of Roper Technologies. The company is known for creating the online construction permit and as one of the first-ever SaaS companies. In 2001, Fisher teamed with the stars of the documentary film Startup.com, including Kaleil Isaza Tuzman, to help entrepreneurs restructure and wind down their companies. In 2004, Fisher cofounded and was Chief Executive Officer of Bharosa, which was acquired by Oracle Corporation in 2007.

CrowdOptic

Fisher co-founded CrowdOptic, Inc. in 2011 with Jeff Broderick, Doug Van Blaricom and Alex Malinovsky. In April 2011, Fisher became the CEO of CrowdOptic. The company is known for its augmented reality technology in use in incident response, medicine and sports. Fisher chose to market CrowdOptic in professional sports first "because it was splashy." Wired magazine's Bruce Sterling wrote about CrowdOptic "I’ve never read a work of fiction or nonfiction that ever implied that such a technology might be possible. In 2016 Business Insider's Julie Bort wrote that "CrowdOptic, which makes a technology so cool, we've never seen anything like it."

Honors

Authorship

Fisher is an adjunct professor at the University of San Francisco. His book Strategic Entrepreneurism: Shattering the Start-Up Entrepreneurial Myths (2008) is required reading for the MBA program at several schools, including the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. The book is also one of three that was selected by the Ohio TechAngels for their project, which studied the timing and strategies involved in the sale of businesses, particularly those financed by angel investors.

Patents

Named on 53 patents globally, Fisher was a co-patentee in a contextual authentication patent awarded to Bharosa, which later received five issued patents and has twelve patents pending. Fisher was also a co-patentee in the technology behind Glass at Work partner CrowdOptic, which triangulates two or more electronic devices focused in the same direction at the same time. Fisher's company remains the only Google Glass partner with issued patents.

Prediction of 2010 US unemployment peak

Fisher has commented that the drop in housing starts is a good indicator of the direction the unemployment rate is headed. He writes: "Historically, when new U.S. housing starts have plunged, unemployment has surged in the following year", concluding that he believes a linear correlation exists between national housing starts and national unemployment in times of severe recession. Fisher made one of the most accurate unemployment forecasts in U.S. history in April 2008 at Marquette University, where he predicted U.S. unemployment would rise to 9% by April 2009.

On Nov. 8, 2008, Fisher stated on National Public Radio that higher unemployment wouldn't increase foreclosures because there weren't many homeowners left who couldn't pay their mortgages, even without a job—although he thought they might not buy as many vehicles and other large purchases.

In August 2009 at the Commonwealth Club of California, Fisher predicted U.S. unemployment would peak at not more than 10.4% before declining to 8.0% by end of 2010. Fisher stated the consumer's home may be the center of the U.S. and international economies, challenging The World Is Flat thesis by Thomas L. Friedman. Fisher has been an outspoken critic of the Treasury's bailout plans, saying "there are various techniques of restructuring that are familiar in the business world, none of which are being used by the government." However, Fisher wrote that "entrepreneurship should not be used to bludgeon the safety net."

Philanthropy

Fisher has served as a trustee of the Nueva School in Hillsborough, CA and was a member of their 2008 capital campaign team. He has served as a trustee of the Pacific Vascular Research Foundation in South San Francisco. Jon has served on the board of the Buck Institute For Age Research.

Personal life

Fisher married Darla Kincheloe Fisher, owner of Koze clothing boutiques, in 2002, and their daughter was born in 2010. In an interview with Blasting News Fisher said that "It is good to have money and work hard, but even if I had the talent to make billions of dollars and it meant trading time with my family, I wouldn’t do it."