Jumping from the 'SHARK to Spread Some 'Genius

I'd like to share with my network and the public at large that I have left my position as CEO of TravelSHARK to focus on the next phase of an organization that I co-founded, House of Genius. As is the case in the life of many pre-revenue startups, TravelSHARK is consolidating resources into Singapore to extend the company's runway. This is a Board level decision that was not an easy one to make, but in the interest of the organization, will give the company the best chance to stretch funding resources far enough to properly take the technology to market. Unfortunately, I will not be making the trek to Singapore thereby ending my time as CEO of TravelSHARK.

I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone involved in this project, from the Board of Directors to the teams here in Colorado and abroad. It has a been a phenomenal 2 years filled with everything you could want from a technology startup. In our first 14 months we:

+ assembled an exceptionally talented team that was constantly being approached (read: to poach) by the likes of Google, Amazon, Netflix, Pandora, among others.

+ built, from scratch, the world's most advanced recommendation engine powered by unstructured social data. This engine is nearly entirely unsupervised and outperforms every social or collaborative filtering based recommendation engine in the market. In most cases, significantly outperforms. This is significant when considering that Foursquare raised ~$96M on the promise to build this type of engine. TravelSHARK has this technology TODAY.

+ Became recognized as one of the travel industry's most innovative technologies in 2013, garnering interest and engagement from industry leaders like Concur, Expedia, Hotwire and too many more to list.

+ Established partnerships to deliver the technology to over 18 million consumers.

+ Developed and released a stealth mobile application for consumer testing of the technology that has received two orders of magnitude organic growth prior to any formal marketing.

The entire team, from our investors to our most junior developers deserve all of the credit. Countless hours, energy, passion and intellect went into our work at TravelSHARK and this group proved to be up to every challenge we faced. Impressive on so many levels, I'm humbled to have just been a small part. For me personally, there were many lessons learned over the last two years in regards to leadership and the challenges of building and bringing an idea to market, internally and externally. I'm incredibly grateful for the opportunity to have worked with some of the most exceptional individuals in their respective areas of expertise and will look back on these past two years fondly.

I want to extend a very special thanks to Ambarish Jash, David Leppan, Graham Easton, Daria Ilgen, Serhat Artun, Irmak Hakman, Owen Robertson, Katie O'Block and Laura Aboli. You have all had a very significant impact on me as a person and leader in too many ways to count. I will forever be grateful and there is no recommendation I could write that would ever capture the entirety of what I believe you all bring to the table.

For anyone looking to connect with the team at TravelSHARK, please do not hesitate to contact me and I will put you in touch with the right person. I will obviously follow the organization's future with great interest and support.

As for what's next for me? Well, I'm very excited to announce that I'll be formally joining Jacqui Dietrich and the House of Genius team as the organization's CEO during the upcoming expansion into 100 cities globally. My initial focus will be to assist with the vision, energy, and technological tools necessary to build on the amazing organic community growth it has realized globally. I intend to fully support and empower Jacqui in her role as the organization's Global Director and COO as she works with the plethora of amazing individuals who are helping to make House of Genius one of the most productive entrepreneurial community services in the world today.

We've nearly finalized our conversion into a Colorado B-Corp and are currently raising capital through a combination of investment and sponsorship. House of Genius represents in many ways what I believe entrepreneurship and innovation can do at scale; build communities that are rooted in the spirit of problem solving, empowerment and enablement for individuals, groups and communities around the world. It's time we made entrepreneurship and innovation a community endeavor, not just an individual one.

The last two years have been nothing short of a thrill ride; I hope to apply all of the lessons and gifts that have been given to me wisely in the next two.

Thanks to everyone who have already sent well wishes, offers of encouragement and support. I am truly humbled and honored to be "connected" with such amazing people.

My best to all,

-Toma