Name Robert Norton | ||
Born 18 April 1972 (age 51) ( 1972-04-18 ) London, England | ||
Robert Lloyd Norton (born 18 April 1972) is a CEO & Co-Founder of Verisart providing real time certification and verification of artworks and collectibles. Verisart applies blockchain technology to the art market and current Board Advisors include Peter Todd core developer for the Bitcoin blockchain protocol and Dr. Ahmed Elgammal, Professor in Computer Science at The Art & AI Lab at Rutgers University are Board Advisors. Our investors include Rhodium and the artist Shepard Fairey. Robert was formerly CEO and co-founder of Sedition art and Saatchi Online.
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Personal life and education
Robert was born in London. He was educated at the City of London School, an independent school for boys, followed by the University of Oxford, from which he graduated with an MA in Modern History.
Career
After completing his studies, he worked for Reuters as a correspondent and producer in London and New York City.
He joined AOL Europe in 1996 as part of their launch team. He later acted as Head of e-commerce where he launched the first shopping channel for AOL UK and signed the company's first pan-European e-commerce deals.
He served as business development director for Nomade.fr, a French search engine, later purchased by Kingfisher and Groupe Arnault, in 1998 and 1999.
With Toby Rowland, later a co-founder of King.com, Robert in 1999 launched his first company, Clickmango.com. The pair secured $5 million in seed financing in eight days, setting a precedent for the fastest round of European seed financing. The business became a case study for the London Business School MBA program for students enrolled in the entrepreneurial management course.
Robert headed TVF International in London, the UK’s largest independent distributor of factual TV programming, in 2002 and 2003. He negotiated rights for acquisitions, co-productions and pre-sales agreements.
In 2003, Robert launched Colorcalm, a lifestyle media business that produced and distributed ambient video content for hotels, hospitals and homes. His clients included W Hotels, Bath & Body Works, Pantone, JetBlue Airways, Peter Saville and John Maeda.
Robert joined King in 2006 to develop distribution and secure licensing deals for content. He was instrumental in forming groundbreaking partnerships with global media companies including NBC, CBS, Endemol, Reveille and Fremantle Media and partnerships with Yahoo.com and RealNetworks. Robert also secured licensing deals for the video game versions of such TV hits as “American Idol,” “Deal or No Deal,” “Biggest Loser” and “1 vs. 100,” among others.
He raised $5 million in 2010 to relaunch Saatchi Online as an ecommerce platform for artists and was appointed CEO. In 2011, together with art dealer Harry Blain, he co-founded and launched Sedition art, the first dedicated platform to distributing art in digital format by the world's leading contemporary artists including Damien Hirst, Bill Viola, Jenny Holzer, Tracey Emin and Shepard Fairey among others.
Robert has written for Wired, The European, CBS Marketwatch and The Financial Times online.
Robert’s international media experience began when he became the press officer of world champion heavyweight boxer Lennox Lewis.