Elie Wurtman is co-founder and general partner at PICO Partners. He brings 25 years of experience as an entrepreneur, investor and executive. He has a hands-on approach to building companies, preferring to work closely with founders and focus on execution from day one. Elie has been founding, building, and managing technology companies since the heady days of AltaVista. He started his first company straight out of college, took three companies public during his twenties, and the thrill and hustle of entrepreneurship has never faded (even after he lived through the agony of the 2000 tech crash). Most recently, he joined Vroom as Executive Chairman, the biggest online car store in the world, which he helped to grow into a billion-dollar Company in the first year of operation. Before that, he served as Executive Chairman at NJoy, a pioneer in tobacco-free cigarettes and an early investor and mentor to the team at ironSource. Elie was a general partner at Benchmark Capital Israel, and prior to that served as CEO at JVP Studios in Jerusalem.
Elie sits on the board of several companies and non-profit organizations, including Siftech ( Jerusalem’s first startup accelerator); Regavim (a high school education project that integrates agricultural work with academic studies); New Spirit (and NGO that harnesses young creative forces to build a thriving creative economy); Machshava Tova (an NPO providing technological access and training to underserved populations in Israel); the Batsheva Dance Company; and the Jerusalem Botanical Gardens.
In parallel to his work at the PICO Partners, Elie invests time and passion into PICO Kids, a breakthrough initiative he launched three years ago to enrich and strengthen STEEM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Entrepreneurship, and Math) in his hometown of Jerusalem. You can also find him pottering about his Bat Shlomo Vineyard, in the north of Israel. In addition to producing fine wines, Bat Shlomo runs an enrichment program for high schoolers which has resulted in a marked improvement in grades, motivation and self-esteem.
Elie received his bachelor’s degrees from Columbia University and the Jewish Theological Seminary. He’s married with three children and resides in Jerusalem and Caesarea.
