Robert Herjavec

Why organisations work with Robert Herjavec

• Two major business exits anchor the credibility. BRAK Systems sold to AT&T Canada for $30.2 million in 2000, and Herjavec Group’s majority stake sold to Apax Partners in 2021. Senior teams hear from an operator who has built and exited at scale.
• Seventeen years as an original Shark on ABC’s Shark Tank, evaluating thousands of founder pitches in real time. Audiences get a working investor’s read on what closes a deal and what kills one.
• A sales-first view of business growth. You Don’t Have to Be a Shark, his Wall Street Journal bestseller, frames sales as the universal skill of business and gives non-sales people a usable discipline.
• Operator-level cybersecurity context from founding and running Herjavec Group, once one of Canada’s largest information security firms, before its 2022 merger into Cyderes. Useful when boards want the threat landscape explained without a vendor agenda.
• An immigrant-founder narrative with verifiable outcomes. Arrived in Halifax at age eight from communist Yugoslavia, then built and exited multiple technology businesses while helping launch one of the most successful business reality formats on network television.

Biography highlights

• Founder of Herjavec Group (2003); served as CEO until stepping down in September 2024 following the company’s 2022 merger with Fishtech Group and rebrand to Cyderes
• Sold BRAK Systems to AT&T Canada for $30.2 million in 2000
• Original cast member on ABC’s Shark Tank since the show’s 2009 debut; also a panelist on Canada’s Dragons’ Den and Shark Tank Australia
• Author of three business books: Driven (2010), The Will to Win (2013), and You Don’t Have to Be a Shark (St. Martin’s Press, 2016), a Wall Street Journal bestseller
• Recipient of the 2012 Ernst & Young Ontario Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Technology and the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal
• BA in English literature and political science, University of Toronto

Biography

Most leaders manage businesses someone else built. Robert Herjavec has founded and exited three. BRAK Systems, the cybersecurity firm he started in his basement, was sold to AT&T Canada for $30.2 million in 2000. Ramp Network, which he ran as VP of Sales, was acquired by Nokia for $225 million.

In 2003 he founded Herjavec Group, which grew into one of Canada’s largest information security businesses. Apax Partners bought a majority stake in 2021. After a 2022 merger with Fishtech Group it became Cyderes, where Herjavec served as CEO until September 2024 and remains an investor and board member.

He has been an original Shark on ABC’s Shark Tank since the show’s 2009 debut. Across seventeen seasons he has heard thousands of founder pitches and decided in real time which to back and which to walk away from. The result is an unusual stockpile of pattern recognition on what closes a deal and what kills one from the investor’s side of the table.

His three books work the same vein. Driven (2010) and The Will to Win (2013) were simultaneous Globe and Mail bestsellers about how persistence and self-discipline build careers. You Don’t Have to Be a Shark (St. Martin’s Press, 2016) reached the Wall Street Journal bestseller list, arguing that sales is a teachable craft any senior leader can use. He won the 2012 Ernst & Young Ontario Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Technology and was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal by the Governor-General of Canada for outstanding service.

Key speaking topics

• Entrepreneurship and the founder mindset
• Sales as a business discipline
• Building and scaling technology companies
• Resilience and persistence in business
• The cybersecurity threat landscape for enterprise leaders
• Growth strategy and going from zero to scale
• Pitch evaluation and the investor’s perspective

Ideal for

• Sales kickoffs and revenue leadership offsites where credibility on selling as a teachable discipline is the priority
• Annual conferences and flagship events where a marquee, household-name keynote needs to anchor the agenda on entrepreneurship and growth
• Founder-led businesses and high-growth firms whose audiences want an operator with multiple verified exits behind him
• Cybersecurity, fintech, and enterprise technology audiences, where his industry pedigree adds weight to the broader entrepreneurship and growth conversation

Audience outcomes

• A sharper read on what actually closes a sales conversation and what kills one before it starts
• The discipline of starting from zero, told by someone who arrived in Halifax with one suitcase and built three businesses worth nine-figure exits
• An investor’s lens on how to evaluate ideas and the founders behind them, built from seventeen years inside the Shark Tank panel
• A working argument that persistence and discipline outperform inherited advantage, with a verifiable career arc behind it: BRAK to AT&T, Ramp to Nokia, Herjavec Group to Apax
• A board-level perspective on cybersecurity risk informed by two decades inside one of Canada’s largest enterprise security operators