Eric Yuan’s Zoom Plans to Disrupt Again
By James Moreau | 16 Feb, 2026

Inspired by a long-distance romance, Eric Yuan’s vision for Zoom continues to redefine how the world connects.

Eric Yuan is the founder and CEO of Zoom Communications, the company that popularized the virtual meeting and shifted how billions of people connect.

Zoom’s success story was driven by a love story.  Yuan was inspired to develop the software in college while in a long-distance relationship.

His vision came to fruition in 2011 when Zoom – originally named Saasbee – was founded with $3 million of seed money.  Eight years later the company’s IPO hit NASDAQ with a valuation over $9 billion. 

The pandemic-driven shift to remote work fundamentally transformed corporate operations, fueling an unprecedented demand for video conferencing solutions.  Zoom hit all-time highs in October 2020 with a market cap over $160 billion.  During this time the company commanded over half of the video conferencing market.

Today Yuan’s net worth is estimated at $6 billion.

Before Zoom disrupted the telecommunications industry, Yuan was a founding engineer at Webex starting in 1997.  He continued his tenure following Cisco’s acquisition of the firm in 2007.  Four years later he ventured into entrepreneurship to build the modern, mobile-friendly video conferencing platform we know today.

Born and raised in Tai’an, China, Yuan’s journey to Silicon Valley was one of persistence – his U.S. visa application was denied eight times before he finally succeeded on his ninth attempt in 1997.  Ten years later he became a naturalized citizen.

The 55-year-old holds a bachelor’s degree in applied mathematics and a master’s in geology engineering from the Shandong University of Science and Technology.

Yuan sees the future of Zoom as an AI-powered “workplace” platform.  Its current AI features support over 30 different languages, enabling automated summaries to begin project management.  Yuan believes that as AI begins to proactively take action on behalf of employees, productivity will fundamentally be redefined – potentially paving the way for a three-day workweek.