Jyoti Bansal


Jyoti Bansal is a Silicon Valley technology entrepreneur. He founded AppDynamics in April 2008, and went on to serve as its CEO until 2015 when he became the company's Chief Strategist and Chairman. AppDynamics was purchased by Cisco Systems for $3.7 billion, a day before AppDynamics was due for an initial public offering.
Bansal was born, raised, and educated in India. In 2000, he entered the United States with a H-1B visa, working for a number of Silicon Valley start-ups before receiving a green card allowing him to strike out on his own to establish AppDynamics.

Early life and education

Bansal was born in in India. He grew up in Rajasthan, where he helped his father run a small farm equipment retail business. Bansal attended the Indian Institute of Technology–Delhi, where he studied computer science from 1995 to 1999.

Career

On July 4, 2000, Bansal moved to the United States, to work in the technology industry in Silicon Valley on a H-1B visa. However, the restrictions of his visa prevented him from creating his own start-up company in the US.
In 2007, Bansal obtained an employment authorization document, and later his permanent residence card. In April 2008, Bansal founded his own start-up, AppDynamics, an application performance management company. The company provides tools for monitoring, diagnosing and troubleshooting performance slowdowns and other glitches in software code. That same year, he received the 5.5 million dollar backing from venture capital firms Greylock Partners and Lightspeed Partners.
Bansal began marketing his services directly to executives at large internet companies. He would connect with them through LinkedIn and contact them through email to offer his product suite for use in their respective businesses.
In Feb 2010, Priceline became one of AppDynamics' first customers, contracting the company to ensure Priceline's "internet application connections are functioning properly." Electronic Arts and Netflix soon followed suit.
Bansal began hiring more employees and by 2013 the company had grown to 200 employees, which included sales staff. When HBO Go, a new internet subscription television service, began experiencing problems on highly anticipated premiere dates, HBO hired Bansal's company to monitor their systems as of May 2015. In August 2015, CNBC credited Bansal for having "saved Game of Thrones." Between 2013 and February 2015, the company grew to 600 employees, with Bansal serving as CEO. By September 2015, AppDynamics had grown to include 900 employees.
In 2015, Bansal became the Chairman and Chief Strategist, handing over day-to-day operations of the company to a new CEO. He went on to serve as the company's Chairman during its sale to Cisco Systems.
In June 2016, Bansal was awarded Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Northern California.
In late 2016, AppDynamics submitted a prospectus to the Securities and Exchange Commission on the initial public offering of its stock. The company was due to open for public trade in January 2017 when a deal was reached, just days before, for the sale of the company to Cisco Systems. The final offered price of the sale totaled $3.7 billion.
In October 2017, Bansal founded Harness, a platform for continuous development.
In May 2018, Bansal announced that he and venture capitalist John Vrionis were launching a new seed fund, called Unusual Ventures. Bansal intends to focus on mentoring early stage startups, partnering with nonprofits and offering frequent masterclasses for budding entrepreneurs.