Halsey Minor

Halsey McLean Minor (born 1964 in Charlottesville, Virginia, USA) is a technology entrepreneur who founded CNET in 1993 (initial plans for the company began in 1992).

Education

Minor attended Woodberry Forest School and the University of Virginia, where he was a member of St. Elmo Hall and received a degree in anthropology. After graduation, he worked at Merrill Lynch, before moving on to start his own company.

Career

Halsey Minor was a key player in the digital publishing revolution. In 1993, he founded CNET Networks, the first comprehensive consumer-facing technology content publisher and one of the most-visited technology information resources in the world. Minor ran CNET for eight years during which time it became one of the Internet's first companies to achieve profitability. Halsey led CNET to become a NASDAQ 100 company and it was acquired by CBS Corporation in 2008 for $1.8 billion.

In 1997, Halsey spun off technology developed by CNET to Vignette, a web-publishing software company, acquiring a 33% stake in the company. Vignette was one of the most successful IPOs of the first tech boom, reaching a market capitalization of $26 billion. Halsey also provided the seed funding for trailblazing music service Rhapsody in 1998.