founded in 1999 as a messaging portal “by some doctors who went through a lot of cash with no revenue.” He says the founders asked him to join in 2002 as both CEO and investor. He had served previously as the CEO at two other software companies in the San Diego area, investing roughly $7 million in San Diego-based Contigo Software and selling the company in 2000 for $98 million to a company now known as Raindance Communications. Moussavian sold Carlsbad-based HawkNet, which he had founded in 1995, to Houston’s BMC software for an undisclosed price in 1995 (he used some of the proceeds from that deal to found AngelHawk Investments in 1996).
Moussavian says his idea for re-energizing MIR3 in 2002 came from his inability to quickly reach employees, which gave rise to his nickname, “IG,” as in instant gratification. “In all these companies, the problem I had was getting a hold of people, and getting information out, and making decisions quickly.” At Contigo Software, Moussavian says he was so frustrated by his inability to get anyone to answer the phone in research and development, which was in a separate facility, that he hired a telephone installer to add a phone number so every phone in the department rang when he called.
The service he initially envisioned for MIR3 would be a replacement for the “calling trees” that many companies had in place during the 1990s as part of their business continuity plans. If business was disrupted, employees would notify others through a cascade of expanding calls. “Allstate Insurance was our first customer—a huge company that was willing to use our company with 12 people to develop and outsource their business continuity plan.”
Today MIR3 has about 100 employees, and provides its two-way messaging platform to thousands of customers, including 46 businesses on the Fortune 100 list of
