By Jules Maltz
There are certain moments that shape your future. For me, one of them was walking through Central Park at dusk in September 2009 waiting for a phone call. I had joined IVP a year before and was working on my second investment. I had been introduced to a small New York startup called Yext six months earlier by Ed Zimmerman, a lawyer, and Yext angel investor, and had spent the last week frantically trying to convince the company that we should lead their Series B.
The phone rings.
Dennis Phelps, a partner at IVP, and I were told that we needed to come to Yext's office right away. The voice on the other end sounded serious. It didn't feel like good news.
Thirty minutes later we walked into a cramped conference room to find the entire Yext executive team waiting for us. On the table in front of them was a signed term sheet and shot glasses. My heart leaped!
The Visionary
Howard Lerman, Yext's CEO, has always had a flair for the dramatic. He prefers live demos to stale presentations. In 2009, he snuck into TechCrunch 50, an early-stage pitch competition, to launch a new product and announced to the audience that he was going to do $20 million in revenue that year. It left everyone speechless. For years, he delivered a weekly manifesto speech to all employees, reminding his team why Yext needed to exist in the world. Board meetings were equally entertaining. We had a war-themed meeting complete with camouflage outfits, a wireless beacon demonstration, and Howard even brought in a 30-year-old Voltron toy to illustrate a particular point about teamwork. Howard was (and is) the ultimate visionary and everything was going well for Yext .until it wasn't.
The Pivot
A year after our investment, Yext's rapid expansion started showing signs of strain. The company's original pay-per-call advertising product for small businesses wasn't growing efficiently. Churn and acquisition costs were too high, and new verticals weren't as profitable as existing ones. Yext faced a choice of trying to fix these challenges or sell the entire business. Instead, Howard and his team picked an ambitious, but risky, third option. Cut the core business to profitability and invest heavily in building an entirely new startup within Yext. Launching Yext Tags in early 2011, the company pivoted to a subscription software product to help large and small companies manage their digital information. The next year, Yext sold its original business, renamed Felix, to IAC to focus 100% on its rapidly-growing software product.
The Team
With the new product working, Howard and his co-founder, Brian Distelburger, turned their attention to building out a world-class team to scale the business. They looked for executives who had operated at larger companies and could handle the challenges of rapid growth. Bringing on Wendi Sturgis, Steve Cakebread, Jeff Rohrs, Jonathan Cherins, Marc Ferrentino, Skip Schipper, Ho Shin, and, recently, Jim Steele, helped propel Yext to new heights, reaching over $124 million of revenues in the company's most recent fiscal year.
The IPO
Last month, Yext went public on the New York Stock Exchange with a closing market cap of over $1 billion. It's been an incredible journey from rapid growth to major challenges to rebirth to rapid growth again - all in the span of less than 8 years.
I'm so grateful that Yext selected IVP as a partner in 2009 - and gave me the chance to grow as a venture capitalist and learn that startups are more like roller coasters than escalators. I'm deeply appreciative of the many early Yext employees (Brian, Brent, Alok, Tom, Sean, Bryan, Temy, Rob, and others), who rose to the challenge when times were tough and fought to make Yext successful today. And, I'm most thankful for Howard, who taught me to always dream bigger, never give up and of course, that ENTP is the best Myers-Briggs personality type
The journey continues, and the Yext IPO is only another milestone on an exciting path far into the future.
As Howard would say:
Onward!
Jules Maltz is a General Partner at IVP, a later-stage venture capital firm based in Menlo Park, CA.
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
02/12/2025
Case Study: How Mid-Atlantic Sports Network Moved to All-IP Distribution in 60 D...
02/12/2025
2025 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame: Lee Corso, Coach, Commentator, FirebrandBy Ken Kerschbaumer
Tuesday, December 2, 2025 - 7:00 am
Print This Story | S...
02/12/2025
SVG All-Stars: Dan Nabors, Senior Director, Remote Engineering, TNT SportsThe veteran tech leader is helping guide Warner Bros. Discovery's at-home' re...
02/12/2025
National Lacrosse League Opens Season With New Cloud-Based Official Replay-Revie...
02/12/2025
Platinum White Paper: The Cinematic Look in Live Production - Bridging Aesthetic...
02/12/2025
SVG India Announces Advisory Board; JioStar's Prashant Khanna Named ChairmanBy Ken Kerschbaumer
Tuesday, December 2, 2025 - 11:15 am
Print This Story |...
02/12/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: New AI Production Tools Workshop' Features ESPN, F...
02/12/2025
Written and directed by Hailey Gates, Atropia won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival....
02/12/2025
The lightweight and highly portable CORVUS-RAVEN, recently demonstrated at the V...
02/12/2025
The lightweight, rugged Panther 2 tri-band VSAT delivers high-speed data communications for Internet, VPN connectivity and video transmission over commercial an...
02/12/2025
eds3_5_jq(document).ready(function($) { $(#eds_sliderM519).chameleonSlider_2_1({...
02/12/2025
NGID volunteers in the United States
NGID volunteers in Mexico
NGID volunteers in India
NGID volunteers in Spain
NGID volunteers in Australia
NGID voluntee...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Media Bureau has issued a reminder that stations in DMAs 111 through 120 must implement its audio descrip...
02/12/2025
SAN DIEGO Sony Electronics today introduced the Alpha 7 V (ILCE-7M5), the fifth generation of its Alpha 7 full-frame mirrorless lineup, powered by the newly dev...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has opened a docket for comments on Nexstar Media Group's proposed $6.2 billion acquisition of Tegna and se...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The National Association of Broadcasters has added a trio of media executives, Veronica Rodriguez, Matt Schnaars and Jeff Warshaw, to its board of di...
02/12/2025
MILAN, Italy Brightcove has released seven new features designed to expand global reach, improve audience engagement, enhance live-streaming quality and streaml...
02/12/2025
BCNEXXT, the developers of the advanced playout platform Vipe, today announced a new Service Provider Partner agreement with NPC Media, the Australian managed p...
02/12/2025
DPA Microphones today announces the immediate availability of its new N-Series Digital Wireless Microphone System for customers throughout the U.S. In addition ...
02/12/2025
Hiltron Communications reports a well attended and successful Space Tech Expo exhibition, held at the Messe Bremen from Tuesday November 18 through Thursday Nov...
02/12/2025
The beginning of September saw Riverfire by Australian Retirement Trust, in association with Channel 9 and Triple M, kick off the 2025 Brisbane Festival in spec...
02/12/2025
SGM Lighting is pleased to announce an exciting new partnership with ACT Entertainment, under which ACT will serve as the exclusive distributor for SGM's ne...
02/12/2025
Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today announced that Telia, the second largest telecom operator in Norway, is modernizing its broadband network with the company's i...
02/12/2025
European cloud data protection specialist Keepit is expanding its sales network in the DACH region and has gained TIM AG, one of the leading value-added distrib...
02/12/2025
Featured products at ISE 2026
This year s ISE 2026 theme "Push Beyond" reflects Calrec s direction of travel. The company is dedicated to supporting the AV an...
02/12/2025
Czech Television, the national public broadcaster, has deployed one of the largest LiveU live production projects in the region for live sports and news coverag...
02/12/2025
Test & measurement innovator, Leader Electronics, has announced the release of v8.2 software for its ZEN and ZEN-W Series, bringing advanced cinematic camera se...
02/12/2025
Global provider of video streaming software and services, Accedo, and OTT platform provider, Magine Pro, have signed a binding agreement to carve out and merge ...
02/12/2025
With proven success in broadcast, OTT, and content supply chains, K.S Avinash set to scale Skandha's service-first approach across APAC
Skandha Media Servi...
02/12/2025
AJA Video Systems has joined the RAVENNA community, a network of partners devoted to advancing the RAVENNA standard for distributing real-time audio over intern...
02/12/2025
HUNT VALLEY, Md. Sinclair and its wholly-owned subsidiary One Media Technologies have released a new report focused on how ATSC 3.0, the IP-based NextGen TV sta...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Media Bureau has issued a reminder that stations in DMAs 111 through 120 must implement its audio descrip...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON Members of the Advanced Television Systems Committee have elected four industry veterans to three-year terms on the organization's board of direc...
02/12/2025
A new survey from S&P Global Market Intelligence Kagan highlights how important social media is for younger consumers, with Gen Z spending 5.1 hours a day on so...
02/12/2025
Faculty Notes: Fall/Winter 2025 Recent accomplishments, releases, and events by Berklee faculty.
December 1, 2025
By
Editorial Staff
The cast of Kind of M...
02/12/2025
Ring In The Holidays With Our Biggest Sale Ever On Ivory II Pianos!From now until December 31st, you can save 50% or more on every Ivory II piano and collection...
02/12/2025
Back to All News
Made in America: How Stranger Things' Electrified the US Economy
Entertainment
02 December 2025
GlobalUnited States
Link copied to cl...
02/12/2025
Back to All News
Culinary Class Wars' Season 2 Trailer Teases New Rules, R...
02/12/2025
--
The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and the International Telecommunication Unio...
02/12/2025
Harmonic's cOS Platform Will Redefine Subscribers' Quality of Experience, Lowering Churn SAN JOSE, Calif. - Dec. 2, 2025 - Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today...
02/12/2025
At AWS re:Invent, NVIDIA and Amazon Web Services expanded their strategic collab...
02/12/2025
S an Nollaig
Hollywood blockbusters The Banshees of Inisherin, Barbie and Oppenheimer make their Irish TV debut
Tune into the classics such as Love Actual...
02/12/2025
Showcasing fresh Irish storytelling and emerging talent Storyland 2025 signals a fantastic time for Irish drama
RT and F s ireann/Screen Ireland are proud to...
01/12/2025
L3Harris and PentenAmio formalise their teaming agreement at MilCIS 2025, streng...
01/12/2025
Artemis II is NASA's first crewed flight test of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft. The crew, from left: Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Vic...
01/12/2025
IRVINE, Calif. Wooden Camera has introduced its new Accessory Collection for the Canon EOS C50. The new lineup includes a low-profile, gimbal-ready cage, expand...
01/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has released a tentative agenda for its Dec. 18 Open Commission Meeting that will include a vote on a report an...
01/12/2025
In most years, a graph of annual local TV ad spending is about as predictable as an electrocardiogram of a reasonably healthy patient in a doctor's office. ...
By Jules Maltz
