Antonio García Martínez (author)
Antonio García Martínez | |
|---|---|
| Other names | AGM |
| Occupation(s) | Author, entrepreneur, product manager, quantitative analyst |
| Known for | Author of Chaos Monkeys; former Facebook product manager; founder and CEO of AdGrok |
| Notable work | Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley |
Antonio García Martínez, also recognized by the initials AGM, is a best-selling author featured on the New York Times list and a seasoned entrepreneur in the technology sector. His professional background includes a product management position at Facebook, founding and leading the adtech firm AdGrok as CEO, and working as a quantitative analyst at Goldman Sachs.
His writings have appeared in notable outlets such as Wired, Vanity Fair, Business Insider, The Guardian, HuffPost, and The Washington Post.
Career
García Martínez earned a degree in physics from the University of California, Berkeley before embarking on his career as a pricing quantitative analyst at Goldman Sachs starting in 2005. He departed the firm in 2008 in the aftermath of the financial crisis and transitioned to a research scientist role at Adchemy. In 2010, he co-founded AdGrok, an advertising technology startup focused on automating Google AdWords bidding, where he served as CEO. AdGrok was selected for Y Combinator's accelerator program and was subsequently acquired by Twitter for $10 million in 2011. While his co-founders moved to Twitter, García Martínez took on the role of Facebook’s inaugural product manager specializing in ad targeting, heading the Facebook Exchange (FBX) team until 2013.
Following his tenure at Facebook, he occupied positions at adtech company Nanigans and mobile analytics firm Branch, alongside providing advisory services to Twitter.
In 2016, he authored Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley, an autobiographical work recounting his experiences within startups and his time at Facebook. The publication garnered favorable reviews within technology media circles.
García Martínez contributed articles to Wired magazine and joined Apple’s Advertising Platforms division in 2021, marking Apple’s renewed venture into advertising after discontinuing its iAd service in 2016. His recruitment sparked internal controversy due to contentious excerpts from his book concerning women, which led to an employee petition at Apple. The company soon confirmed his exit, reaffirming its dedication to fostering an inclusive workplace environment. García Martínez maintained that the controversial passages were misrepresented and noted that Apple had full awareness of his history prior to hiring him.
In 2023, he launched Spindl, a startup operating within the Web3 space, and became associated with the University of Austin, an institution co-established by venture capitalist Joe Lonsdale and journalist Bari Weiss.
Books
- García Martínez, Antonio. Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley. HarperCollins. .
Personal
In 2021, García Martínez publicly shared his decision to convert from Catholicism to Judaism.
External links
- Articles with short description
- Articles with hCards
- No local image but image on Wikidata
- Living people
- Year of birth missing (living people)
- 21st-century American businesspeople
- 21st-century American male writers
- 21st-century American non-fiction writers
- American autobiographers
- American business writers
- American male non-fiction writers
- Apple Inc. employees
- Facebook employees
- Goldman Sachs people
- Converts to Judaism from Roman Catholicism