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Afif Khoury is the Founder & CEO of SOCi, a local marketing platform that aims to solve and manage the complex digital workflow of large, multi-location enterprises.
After earning a degree in neuroscience and physiology from UC San Diego in 1998, Afif worked in a genetics lab for a while and even had his work published in the Journal of Cell Biology. Shortly after that, he made the radical decision to go study law and business at Northwestern University, and ended up starting his first company SymptomCare.com while in graduate school.
After the dot-com crash in 2000, Afif spent some time as an attorney representing emerging growth companies and the venture and private equity funds that invested in them. He chose to return to his passion of entrepreneurship a few years later, raising $70 million for his venture fund, Scatter Ventures. To this day, his love for the life sciences remains, mainly in the form of investments in biotech companies.
One of Scatter Ventures’ investments was a digital marketing company that Afif became very involved with – so much so that he ended up becoming its CEO, and eventually sold the company. After chatting with the startup’s lead engineer, they decided to co-found SOCi together in 2012 eventually building one of the fastest-growing companies in the U.S.
Tune in to hear more about Afif’s successful journey transitioning from science and law to entrepreneurship and investing in tech companies.
As mentioned in the episode: If your company is struggling as a result of the current pandemic, check out information about government-sponsored PPP (payment protection program) loans here (https://bit.ly/3eqWOaP). See the list of fintech companies assisting the SBA with loans here (https://bit.ly/2OoB70u).
Thanks to our partners at Cox Business for their support in enabling us to grow the San Diego ecosystem.
Afif’s favorite local tacos:
Fish tacos from Pacifica Del Mar
Connect with Afif:
Twitter: @afifkhoury
Keep up with SOCi:
Website: https://www.meetsoci.com/
Facebook: @MeetSOCI
Twitter: @meetsoci
Instagram: @meetsoci
