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Tony Hsieh, the former Zappos chief who catapulted the shoe company into the big leagues with a sale to Amazon and then used the proceeds of his success in a huge project to jumpstart the regeneration of a run down part of Las Vegas, Nevada, with technology and wider business investments, has passed away at the age of 46.
The cause was injuries he sustained from a house fire, a spokesperson for Hsieh confirmed to TechCrunch. He was with his brother in Connecticut at the time of the fire. It is not known if anyone else was injured.
The ultimate cause of Hsieh’s death is still under investigation. We will update this as we learn more. The full statement from the DTP companies, which spearheaded Project Downtown (Hsieh’s gigantic initiative to regenerate the very dilapidated and old part of Las Vegas) is below.
The news sent shockwaves mid-Thanksgiving weekend and through a community in a city – heavily dependent on tourism – that has been hit extremely hard by the Covid-19 global health pandemic.
Hsieh was a bright, offbeat, and – for many people, often very straightforward – caring person, regularly described as a visionary.
It wasn’t an exaggeration. Growing up in the Bay Area, he sold his first business – a marketing technology company called LinkExchange – to Microsoft when he was just 24, in 1998.
Using some of the proceeds from this, he formed a venture capital firm called Venture Frog. ShoeSite.com, founded in 1999 by Nick Swinmurn, at a time when the latter could see a change in the way people bought shoes, was doing a lot more online.
Hsieh was enterprising in his investing instincts and went on to play a more practical role in the startup, which was eventually rebranded as Zappos. As CEO of Zappos, Hsieh moved the company from the Bay Area to the outskirts of Vegas in 2004 to develop a larger customer service operation, managed under a particularly strong flat management philosophy aimed at to empower and inspire employees. His leadership helped propel him to huge growth: in 2009, he sold Zappos to Amazon for around $ 1.2 billion (a truly giant sum for an e-commerce startup at the time).
He then went on to run the business and used the product of that work to focus on his next big project: urban regeneration.
Las Vegas is a city that leaves little room for sentimentality. Located in the middle of the desert, the city has long focused on growth, opening up new, seemingly limitless, horizons for doing so. For years, that meant huge swathes of ‘older’ Vegas businesses in the downtown area simply lay empty, leading the larger area to become a hotbed of crime and poverty. . As in many other urban centers, it is a vicious cycle: people focus on building newer homes and businesses elsewhere, making older areas even more neglected and vulnerable.
Hsieh saw the charm of the city center, full of 20th century Modernist flourishes under its most obvious signs of decline, and proceeded to purchase huge pieces of the area: apartment buildings, houses, small structures. shops, old casinos and hotels, and empty lots. .
His vision wasn’t just to be a real estate mogul – although that was clearly something he was interested in as well – but to regenerate Vegas into the mold of what he knew best: technology.
He then invested in a huge series of startups, on the condition that they move to Vegas to set up their businesses downtown, to attract entrepreneurs and jobs to the area.
There were a lot of weird elements to the effort: it wasn’t just about doing tough business, and some of it was just trying to have fun on a large scale. Inspired by Burning Man, for example, Hsieh paid to have several of the structures built for the festival in the desert transported and permanently installed in the city center.
Two memorable evenings I spent with him in Vegas really highlighted his profile in the city.
Jumping from casino to bar to restaurant, one evening we found ourselves in an excellent karaoke dive at the piano where his childhood best friend and I sang duets by Duran Duran and he pushed Frenet Brancas away. People flocked to him everywhere he went (so many breathless “Hi, Tony” from many women we passed). I remember wondering if that was how being a mafia boss (with a friend playing the role of a consigliere, or me a night guest) was like daytime.
Of course, the downtown project, as it has been called, was a grand vision, and like many great visions, it has had its ups and downs.
This is not surprising: it is not always enough to want something to exist, and the success rate in technology is actually very low. And the quirky approach didn’t always work out the best way, and at times obscured what could really be going on. Case in point: Hsieh abruptly stepped down as CEO of Zappos earlier this year, with no explanation given for the move, having held the position for 21 years.
Yet between Zappos and what Hsieh built in the city, his work and his big ideas were and are an important testament to the impact that the tech industry can have with a little imagination and a lot of hard work and hard work. perseverance.
Our condolences go out to his family and many friends, as well as to everyone involved in the tech and business world he helped create.
DTP statement below:
Hello, my name is Megan Fazio and I am in charge of public relations for DTP Companies, formerly known as the Downtown Project, of which Tony Hsieh is the visionary. With a heavy and devastated heart, we regret to inform you that Tony Hsieh passed away peacefully on November 27, 2020 surrounded by his beloved family.
Tony’s kindness and generosity touched the lives of everyone around him and made the world bright forever. Providing happiness has always been her mantra, so instead of mourning her transition, we ask you to join us in celebrating her life.
On behalf of all employees and employees of DTP Companies, we would like to extend our deepest condolences to Tony’s family and friends who have all lost Tony as a loved one, visionary and friend. Tony was highly regarded by all his friends and colleagues in the tight-knit family of DTP companies, so this heartbreaking tragedy is one that affects many involved.
We ask you to continue to respect the privacy of the family during this very difficult and difficult time.
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