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Omar S. Amanat is a U.S. businessman and entrepreneur who has been profiled in Fortune Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times, and is a frequent public speaker. Named one of Wall Street's "Top Ten Most Influential Technologists", Amanat was a pioneer in the electronic brokerage industry.

Family life

Born in Queens, New York to a Muslim father named Sharif and Muslim mother named Hamida who had emigrated from India and often went to mosques in the State of New Jersey and in the State of New York, Amanat was an athlete in school in New Jersey. He attended the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton School of Business undergraduate program where he later became part of the Wharton School's Entrepreneur in Residence (EIR) faculty program.

Amanat is currently married to an Indian-American dentist in the United States named Sabiya Amanat and he is also married to a model from the Czech Republic named Helena Houdová . He has children with both women to whom he is currently married, including three children with his Indian-American wife and one child with his Czech wife. Amanat grew up with three siblings: an older brother named Irfan Amanat, a younger brother named Osman Amanat and a younger sister named Sana Rehmat Amanat.

Career

He began his entrepreneurial career at Datek Online, one of the pioneers in online brokerage services, which was sold to Ameritrade for $1.3 billion. He left Datek to co-found CyberBlock and co-designed the trading platform CyberTrader, which was acquired by Charles Schwab in 2000 for $488 million.

He then became the founder, CEO and majority shareholder of Tradescape Corporation, a next-generation brokerage and technology firm. It processed over 10% of NASDAQ's daily trading volume and was one of the largest electronic brokerage firms in the United States (by trading volume) in 2002 when he sold it to E*Trade for total consideration worth $280 million including $180 million in contingent consideration. This deal made him one of E*Trade's largest shareholders. Tradescape was named as one of the "Top 50 Private Companies" in the United States by Red Herring Magazine.

Amanat sits on numerous boards including the Board of Trustees for the Harlem Youth Development Foundation, Human Rights Watch, is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a Trustee of the Democratic National Committee and Malaria No More and was recently the Vice Chairman of the Acumen Fund, which was named one of the "5 Charities changing the face of Global Philanthropy" by Barron's.

Amanat recently began to explore using the power of film to achieve social change and co-founded a $200 million feature film company with a mission to "make films that will change the world" and also helped to create and is a founding board member of a $1 billion new Hollywood studio/production and distribution venture that produces and distributes 12 Hollywood feature films per year.

After selling securities companies to industry giant E*Trade in 2002 and becoming one of its largest shareholders, Amanat sued the company seeking $1.5 billion in additional compensation for missed payments and both sides claimed breach of contract among other claims.

Media production

Amanat was involved early on in Bridges TV, the Muslim television network headed by Muzzammil S. Hassan which premiered in 2004. According to Amanat:

I realized that the only way to undo misconceptions was to create our own media forum from which our stories and culture would be shared with the world. Other cultural groups have gained acceptance and increased understanding through the forum of media. Why can't Muslims do the same?

Also involved with producing films, Amanat was most recently an Executive Producer, Co-Founder, and Founding Chairman of Groundswell Productions with Michael London, which financed and produced two Academy Award nominated films in 2009 including The Visitor which received a nomination for Best Actor (Richard Jenkins) and Milk which received 8 nominations including Best Picture, Best Director (Gus Van Sant) and Best Actor (Sean Penn). He also Executive Produced with Ebay Founding President Jeff Skoll, via his film company Participant Productions several socially conscious films including The Visitor and Darfur Now featuring George Clooney. Other films Amanat was Executive Producer of or that his companies have helped to produce include 2008's Smart People, Appaloosa, and The Mysteries of Pittsburgh among other films.

References

1. Schwartz, Nelson D. (February 19, 2001). "Can't Keep A Good Day Trader Down Online brokers like Charles Schwab, E*Trade, and Ameritrade may be suffering, but day traders are still partying like it's 1999". FORTUNE Magazine.
2. "Omar Amanat". Alacra Wiki. Retrieved 2007-08-29.
3. "Omar Amanat Bio". classicalmusicconsortium.com. Retrieved 2009-03-22.
4. ""Omar Amanat: Wharton School of Business" - Wharton Finance Conference, October 10th 2003". Whartonfinanceconference.com. 2003-10-10. Retrieved 2009-03-22.
5. Kaspar, Mary Alice (November 7, 2003). "Schwab affiliate moving: CyberTrader to leave Loop 360 for Research Park offices". Austin Business Journal. Retrieved 2007-08-29.
6. "E*Trade Shareholder Filing: S.E.C 10-Q Quarterly Report" (PDF). shareholder.com. June 30, 2002.
7. "Top 50 Public and Private Companies in the United States". Red Herring Magazine. April 19, 2001.
8. "Bridges TV (May 7, 2003 )". Sign On San Diego. 2003-05-07. Retrieved 2009-03-22.
9. WorldNetDaily.com: Muslim TV coming to America(May 02, 2003)
10. "News aljazeerah.info: First American Muslim Television Channel Announced by Bridges Network". Aljazeerah.info. 2003-05-02. Retrieved 2009-03-22.
11. "Omar Amanat". IMDB.com.

• American businesspeople
• Living people