Steven M. Elefant // Team
Steven M. Elefant is a serial entrepreneur who has founded and led successful businesses for over 25 years in Silicon Valley. Steven has extensive technical, marketing, sales and business management experience in enterprise and client software, distribution and the retail marketplace. He was an early pioneer in the creation of Electronic Commerce and has been a frequent industry speaker.
Steven was the former Chairman, President, CEO and Co-Founder of ICVerify Inc., the developer of ICVerify software, the worldwide leader in PC Credit / Debit card, check authorization and payment processing software. While running ICVerify, he founded Payment Processing Inc. (PPI), which was subsequently spun out into a separate company and is now one of the nation's top 25 Bankcard processors.
Steven completed a $75 million dollar successful merger with CyberCash Inc. (NASDAQ: CYCH) in May 1998 where he then became Vice-Chairman. During that time he forged strategic partnerships with companies including American Express, Intel, Visa International, IBM, JDA, First Data Corp. and others.
PriceRadar, Inc. was Steven’s next successful venture where he was Executive Vice President and Co-Founder. PriceRadar was the leader in merchant and consumer services for online Consumer Auctions. During his tenure at PriceRadar he formed strategic partnerships with companies including eBay, Ask Jeeves, Andale, Twentieth Century Fox and Gary Burghoff (Radar O’Reiley), The Sharper Image, West Marine, Readers Digest / Good Catalog / Gifts.com, Celebration Fantastic, iGo and others. PriceRadar’s technology was sold to eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) in March of 2001.
Steven is the former President and Chief Operating Officer of Yaga, Inc, a leading provider of an ASP service for Internet publishers and merchants to manage merchandise and process payments for both digital content and physical goods whose technology was sold to Digital River (NASDAQ: DRIV). He formed strategic relationships for Yaga with companies including Time Magazine, CNN, NASCAR, Knight Ridder, Gannett, Conde Nast, Ziff Davis and strategic partners such as PaymentTech, Wells Fargo, Authorizenet and others.
Steven was a Venture and is currently a Limited Partner at Claremont Creek Ventures in Oakland California, and is a limited partner in several other Venture Capital firms including US Venture Partners, Mohr Davidow Ventures, Crosslink Ventures, etc.
Steven has been personally investing for many years. Steven was an early member of the Keiretsu Forum and is currently a member of the Keiretsu Forum Venture Capital and software committees. Keiretsu Forum is the largest angel investment network in the world, with 500 accredited private equity investors, venture capitalists and corporate/institutional investors. He currently serves on several technology company Boards of Directors and Advisory Boards as well as the United States Secret Service and FBI Electronic Crimes Task Forces.
Steven holds a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He has been a licensed private pilot for over 30 years and currently has Single, Multi Engine, Seaplane and Instrument ratings. In his spare time he enjoys flying, tennis, golf, scuba, wine tasting and international travel. He lives in Lafayette, CA with his wife of 22 years, Debbie, and their twin children who attend UCSD and UOP.