François M. de Gaspé Beaubien / Chairman, AquaAction
Mr de Gaspé Beaubien obtained a BA with honours from Haverford College before earning an MBA with distinction at Harvard Business School in 1989. Because of his strong academic performance, he was recruited by the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity, one of the oldest and most prestigious academic honour societies in the United States.
After concluding his studies, François rose the publishing ranks from publisher of New England Monthly magazine to eventually become President of Telemedia Publishing, Canada’s largest consumer magazine company at the time with titles ranging from TV Guide to Elle magazine. He and his team turned the organization from losses to the most profitable publishing group in Canada and he then sold that division in 2000. He and his brother oversaw the expansion of their radio division as co-CEOs to become Canada’s largest radio broadcaster, Telemedia, which they then sold in 2002. In 2003, François acquired Zoom Media, an indoor advertising company. Since he became CEO, the company has experienced tremendous growth, enabling gym owners to digitally entertain and educate their members while empowering advertisers to engage with an active lifestyle audience of 40 million across all of Canada, the USA, and the United Kingdom. He is the sole owner of Zoom. www.zoommedia.com
The businessman is also the co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Hivestack, a global company operating in 25 countries that allows advertisers to target custom audiences digitally, based on physical world behaviors (combining the engagement of mobile devices with digital screens outside of the home, what is now referred to as programmatic DOOH). www.hivestack.com François sold Ayuda Media Systems in 2019, a software company utilized across 22 countries for its billboard management systems of which he was the Executive Chairman of the board.
He is very involved in the industry and serves as Chairman of the board of the Digital Place Based Advertising Association (DPAA), a worldwide initiative based out of NYC seeking to foster the growth of Digital Out Of Home (DOOH) media by bringing together market participants (media owners and tech suppliers) and educating marketers. www.dpaa.org
He is also the Chairman of Aqua Action, his family’s foundation non-profit initiative to find solutions to fresh waters challenges through entrepreneurial tech innovations. www.aquaaction.org
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