Leadership

Yaron Galai and Ori Lahav founded Outbrain in 2006.
Today, the company operates out of 16 global offices and partners with publishers and marketers in more than 55 countries.

Executive Team

Yaron Galai

Co-Founder & CEO

Yaron Galai
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Yaron Galai is Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Outbrain. Prior to founding Outbrain, Mr. Galai was Co-Founder, SVP of Quigo, Inc., a provider of performance-based marketing solutions for advertisers and premium publishers. He previously served as the CEO of the company for three years. Quigo was acquired by AOL in December 2007. Previously, Mr. Galai was Co-Founder & VP Business Development at Ad4ever, a developer of rich-media advertising technologies for the web which was later acquired by Atlas (a division of aQuantive). Earlier, he was the Founder of NetWorks Web Design - an SEO and web design firm. At NetWorks he oversaw the production and search engine optimization of over 30 websites. Mr. Galai studied industrial design at the Holon Technological Institute, and is a Major (reserve) officer in the Israel Navy.

David Kostman

Co-CEO

David Kostman
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David Kostman is Co-CEO of Outbrain. He’s served in that role since November, 2017. In addition to his role at Outbrain, Kostman serves as the chairman of the board of NICE Ltd., as a director of privately held companies ironSource and TIVIT SA and is Co-Founder of Nanoosh. He has also served on the board of Retalix. Previously, Kostman served as CEO of Delta Galil USA and as COO of Verticalnet. He was also a Managing Director in the investment banking division of Lehman Brothers, heading the Global Internet Group, and an investment banker at NM Rothschild & Sons. Kostman holds a Bachelor of Law degree from Tel Aviv University and a Master of Business Administration from INSEAD.

Elise Garofalo

Chief Financial Officer

Elise Garofalo
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Elise Garofalo is Chief Financial Officer at Outbrain. From February 2010 to April 2014, she served as the Senior Vice President, Treasurer and Investor Relations at Revlon, Inc. Prior to that, Elise was the Chief Financial Officer of Marakon Associates, Inc. Elise holds a BS in Accounting from The University of Connecticut’s School of Business and an MBA from Vanderbilt University.

Ori Lahav

Co-founder & CTO | GM, Israel

Ori Lahav
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Ori Lahav is Co-Founder, CTO and General Manager, Israel at Outbrain, and he oversees the company's R&D center located in Netanya, Israel. Prior to co-founding Outbrain, Ori led the R&D groups in search and classification at Shopping.com, which was acquired by eBay for $634 million. Ori also previously led the video streaming server group at technology company Vsoft. A practical engineer from the Rupin Academic Institute Ori is also a Major (reserve) officer in the Israeli Navy.

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We operate out of 16 global offices and we partner with publishers and marketers in over 55 countries, including the U.S., UK, France, Brazil, India and Japan

Board of directors

  • Yaron Galai
  • Shlomo Dovrat
  • Jonathan (Yoni) Cheifetz
  • Ziv Kop
  • Yossi Sela
  • Dominique Vidal

  • Yaron Galai co‑founded Outbrain in 2006 and has served as our Chief Executive Officer since then. From 2000 until it was acquired by AOL Time Warner in December 2007, Mr. Galai served as Senior Vice President of Quigo Technologies, Inc., a company that he co-founded and that was a provider of performance‑based marketing solutions for advertisers and premium publishers. Mr. Galai studied industrial design at the Holon Technological Institute in Holon, Israel.

  • Shlomo Dovrat has served as a director of our company since 2009. Mr. Dovrat has over 30 years of experience in high-tech investments. Mr. Dovrat is a co-founder of the Viola Group and General Partner and Co-Founder of Viola Ventures (formerly Carmel), an Israeli venture capital firm. Mr. Dovrat previously served as the Chairman of ECI Telecom Ltd. from 2002 through its acquisition in 2007 for approximately $1.2 billion. Mr. Dovrat also served as the President and CEO of OshapTechnologies Ltd. (formerly NASDAQ: OSHSF), which was acquired by SunGard Data Systems Inc. (NYSE: SDS) in 1999. Mr. Dovrat also founded Tecnomatix Technologies, Ltd. (formerly NASDAQ: TCNO) and served as its CEO and President from its inception until 1995, as its Chairman until 2001 and thereafter as director until 2005. Mr. Dovrat currently serves as a director of ironSource, Red Bend, cVidya, eXelate and other privately held companies.

  • Jonathan (Yoni) Cheifetz has served as a director of our company since 2008. Mr. Cheifetz has served as a Partner at Lightspeed Ventures since June 2006. Mr. Cheifetz serves as a Director of BlueVine Inc., eBuzzing, EyeView Inc., Personetics Technologies Ltd., Ginger Software, Inc., Scodix Ltd. and SolarEdge Technologies Inc. Mr. Cheifetz holds a B.Sc. in Applied Mathematics and Computer Science from the Tel Aviv University and an M.S. in Computer Science and Applied Mathematics from the Weizman Institute of Science.

  • Ziv Kop has served as a director of our company since its inception in 2006. Mr. Kop is currently a Partner at Innovation Endeavors. Prior to that he was our Chief Operating Officer between 2014-2016. From its inception in 2003 until June 2013, Mr. Kop was a Managing Partner at Glenrock Israel, where he invested and served on the board of a number of private and public startup companies including Mobileye, Quigo, Outbrain, Kamada, Evogene. Prior to Glenrock, Ziv served as Chief Executive Officer of POC Management Consulting, an Israeli consultancy in the field of strategic planning. Mr. Kop currently serves as a director of Kamada Ltd. (NASDAQ: KMDA), Evogene (NYSE: EVGN), Dynamic Yield, OwnBackUp, and Hysolate. Mr. Kop holds an LLB and a BA in business administration, from Tel Aviv University, and is a graduate of INSEAD’s Young Managers Program.

  • Yossi Sela has served as a director of our company since 2013. Mr. Sela is the Managing Partner of Gemini Israel Funds, a leading Venture Capital fund, which invests primarily in seed and early stage Israeli technology companies. In this capacity, Mr. Sela sits on the boards of directors of a number of Gemini portfolio companies, including JFrog Ltd., LoyalBlocks Ltd., QualiSystems Ltd. and Xjet Solar Ltd. Mr. Sela holds a B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from the Technion—Israel Institute of Technology and an MBA from Tel Aviv University in Israel.

  • Dominique Vidal has served as a director of our company since 2011. Since September 2007, Mr. Vidal has served as a Partner of Index Venture Management LLP (formerly of Index Venture Management Limited), a venture capital advisory firm which provides advice to the Index Ventures fund, and serves on the board of directors of several companies in the technology sector. Prior to joining Index Venture Management LLP, Mr. Vidal was the Managing Director of Yahoo! Europe from 2004 to 2007. Mr. Vidal received an Engineering degree from École Supérieure d’Électricité (Supélec). Mr. Vidal serves on the board of directors of Criteo S.A., a company specializing in digital performance advertising. Mr. Vidal holds a BS in Engineering from École supérieure d’électricité, or Supelec, in Gif‑Sur‑Yvette, France.