Fitbit Founder James Park Will Speak At Disrupt SF 2015

James Park is on a roll. Best known as the co-founder and CEO of Fitbit, his company went public on June 18 — and things couldn’t have gone more smoothly. Fitbit is now worth $9 billion despite facing tough competition.

It seems like nothing can stop the company’s fitness-tracking devices. When Fitbit announced that it would go public, the company planned to raise around $350 million by pricing its shares between $14 to $16. But it ended up offering its shares for $20.

If your initial share price is too low, you leave money on the table. If it’s too high, you risk looking at your shares tanking quickly after going public. So was Fitbit too ambitious? Absolutely not. Shares soared more than 50 percent on the day of its IPO, breaking the $30 barrier minutes after the start of trading (NYSE:FIT).

And it’s not just a one-day success. Fitbit is now trading around $43.63 less than two months after its IPO — a whooping 118 percent increase compared to the $20 offer price. The company now has a solid lineup of fitness trackers, covering every price point between $60 and $250.

This doesn’t mean that everything will be fine for Fitbit. The company is facing important challenges — consumer electronics heavyweights such as Apple are now releasing smartwatches with promising fitness-tracking features. It’s hard to say whether dedicated fitness-tracking devices will survive smartwatches.

For all these reasons, we’re excited to tell you that Fitbit’s James Park will speak onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt SF, which takes place September 21-23. It’s a pivotal moment for the company, and we can’t wait to have Park’s take on it.

Before co-founding Fitbit, Park was a co-founder of Windup Labs, which was acquired by CNET in 2005. He also co-founded Epesi Technologies and worked for Morgan Stanley to develop trading software.

As a reminder, Fitbit was a finalist at TC50 in 2008 (TC50 eventually became TechCrunch Disrupt). This time, Park won’t be pitching the company in our Battlefield competition, though. He will join our lineup of stellar speakers, including Cowboy Ventures founder Aileen Lee, who coined the phrase “unicorn,” Y Combinator President Sam Altman and legendary venture capitalist Vinod Khosla.

To hear all these excellent speakers and more at Disrupt SF at San Francisco’s historic Pier 70, purchase tickets (at special early bird prices) right here.

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