Ithaca Journal, January 29, 2009, Thursday

Ithaca Journal

January 29, 2009, Thursday

Ithaca Journal

Priceline founder named Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year

Jay Walker, chairman of Walker Digital and founder of Priceline.com, has been named Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year 2009 and will be honored on campus during the Entrepreneurship@Cornell Celebration April 16-17.

Walker has founded successful startups with more than 75 million customers, including Walker Digital in 1994. A privately held research and development lab in Stamford, Conn., Walker Digital has invented solutions for many kinds of business problems in 15 industries.

Walker is best known as the founder of Priceline.com, a billion-dollar public company with tens of millions of active customers who use the site for travel purchases. He also co-founded Synapse, which used the credit card processing network to revolutionize the magazine subscription business and is now a unit of Time Warner.

Now Walker is leading a team that launched yappr.com, where users practice their language skills.

The editors of Time magazine have twice named him one of the "50 most influential business leaders in the digital age," and Business Week selected him as one of its 25 Internet pioneers most responsible for "changing the competitive landscape of almost every industry in the world."

Walker graduated from Cornell University in 1977 with a bachelor of science degree in industrial relations.

He serves on the Board of World Information Transfer, a United Nations non-governmental organization, and is a frequent speaker on college campuses, as well as a guest on numerous television and radio shows.

The Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year award is given annually to a Cornell graduate who best exemplifies entrepreneurial achievement, community service and high ethical standards. The first recipient of the award was given in 1984 to Sandy Weill, former Chairman of Citigroup

For further information about the Celebration or Cornell's university-wide entrepreneurship program, contact the Entrepreneurship@Cornell office at 255-1576 or visit the Web site at www.eship.cornell.edu.