Mark Pincus – The Newest Billionaire in Silicon Valley

Zynga, the maker of Mafia Wars and FarmVille, is about to go public in the biggest tech stock offering since Google. Gary Rivlin profiles the company’s iconoclastic founder.

He had a net worth north of $30 million. He had given birth to two successful tech startups; he owned a house on a hill overlooking San Francisco. He owned, or at least co-owned, a plane.

But in 2004, Mark Pincus, aging whiz kid creeping up on 40 and with crow’s feet deepening around his eyes, felt he hadn’t really made it in Silicon Valley.  Charlie Rose’s producers never phoned to have him on the show. Heads didn’t turn when he walked into a room. Strangers didn’t instantly recognize him the way they recognized Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

But with Zynga—the online game maker behind Mafia Wars, FarmVille, and other elaborate time wasters that he founded in 2007—poised to go public on Friday, Pincus is certainly A-list now. The company he named after his bulldog, now deceased, is expected to raise around $1 billion, making it the largest tech IPO since Google. And with its public offering, Pincus is set to become Silicon Valley’s newest billion-dollar man.

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