Jack Dangermond

Jack Dangermond
Jack Dangermond speaking at Harvard, 2006
Born	1945
Residence	Redlands, California, US
Nationality	American
Alma mater	California State Polytechnic University, Pomona University of Minnesota Harvard University
Occupation	President, ESRI
Known for	Co-founder, Environmental Systems Research Institute
Net worth	$3.1 billion (May 2015)
Spouse(s)	Laura Dangermond

Jack Dangermond is an American businessman and environmental scientist. In 1969, he co-founded with his wife Laura the Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI), a privately held Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software company. In May 2015, his net worth was estimated by Forbes at US$3.1 billion.

Dangermond is the company's President and Founder, and he works at ESRI's headquarters in Redlands, California. Dangermond founded ESRI to perform land use analysis; however, its focus evolved into GIS software development, highlighted by the release of ARC/INFO in the early 1980s; the development and marketing of ARC/INFO positioned ESRI with the dominant market share among GIS software developers. Today ESRI is the largest GIS software developer in the world and its flagship product, ArcGIS, traces its heritage to Dangermond's initial efforts in developing ARC/INFO.

Jack Dangermond was born in 1945, and grew up in Redlands, California as the son of Dutch immigrants. His parents owned a plant nursery in Redlands. Dangermond attended Redlands High School.

Dangermond completed his undergraduate work at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Cal Poly Pomona), studying landscape architecture and environmental science. He then earned a Master of Architecture degree in Urban Planning from the University of Minnesota, and a Master of Landscape Architecture degree from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design GSD in 1969. His early work in the school's Laboratory for Computer Graphics and Spatial Analysis (LCGSA) led directly to the development of ESRI's ARC/INFO GIS software. He has been awarded 13 honorary doctoral degrees from universities around the world.