George Berkowski

One of the first employees of HAILO and author of the best-selling book ‘How to Build a Billion Dollar App’, George Berkowski­­­­ has advised numerous start-ups and worked as an advisor to Techstars and Seedcamp.

With his unique inside view of the inception and growth of an innovative business from the earliest days, he  provides critical lessons and high-level guidance to corporate audiences.

A successful entrepreneur, he has built businesses in manned space flight, online dating, transportation and mobile apps – including his new venture IceCream, a Camera app that never runs out space.

George studied rocket science and economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and business at the École Supérieure de Commerce de Paris.

In 2007, he co-founded WooMe.com, and under his lead, built one of the most innovative social dating and video chat sites on the web. The site grew to over 10 million users, with offices in Los Angeles and London, and substantial revenues. In 2011 it was acquired by Zoosk.com (the world’s largest dating site with over 100 million members).

George also served as the VP of Marketing and Business Development at MirCorp, a company specializing in space tourism (MirCorp made Dennis Tito the first space tourist by arranging his visit to the International Space Station).

As the Chief Product Officer of HAILO, from 2011 to 2013, he led the product team of the internationally successful taxi hailing app to help grow the company to over 220 people and hundreds of millions in revenue.

From 2008 to 2014, he served as the Chairman of MIT’s Enterprise Forum in the UK - a forum for leading entrepreneurs and thought leaders (including people like Ray Kurzweil, Guy Kawasaki, Niklas Zennstrom and many others). He was also a judge and advisor for The Next Big App (with Facebook) - a pan-European competition.

His book ‘How to Build a Billion Dollar App’ delves into secrets behind the success of the select group of apps that have achieved billion-dollar success. It draws on his interviews with the founders and teams of the billion-dollar app club members, including Instagram, Whatsapp, Snapchat, Candy Crush, Square, Viber, Clash of Clans, Angry Birds, Uber and Flipboard.

Heavily involved in the UK and US startup scenes, George now divides his time between London and Silicon Valley.

He is currently the CEO and founder of Mirror Mirror (MRRMRR), a technology company focused on creating augmented reality, video and photo apps, and the Director of Isbjorn, a Product Management Consulting Company that works with high growth, VC-backed technology start-ups and leading technology companies.

A digital entrepreneur and visionary developer, George offers businesses invaluable advice on how to get off the ground.