![Brian OKelley: Appnexus [Princeton Entrepreneurs] @princetonengineering](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/rHmabtbrGsM/maxresdefault.jpg)
Uploaded January 2015 | Updated September 2026, 16 hours ago
Brian O'Kelley is CEO and co-founder of AppNexus, the world’s largest independent ad tech company. Before founding AppNexus, O’Kelley was chief technology officer of Right Media, where his team invented the first online ad exchange. Right Media sold to Yahoo! in 2007 for $850 million.
O’Kelley, who has been called “the new king of ad tech,” credits past failures with his current success. Failure, he says “was the only way to really quickly learn and build skills that would allow me, once I was in the right place at the right time, to actually be successful. I think the biggest risk for an entrepreneur is often that if you are successful for the wrong reasons – like if you get lucky – then when hard times come or the business grows, you don’t have the next set of skills you need to overcome those challenges.”
O’Kelley is an active investor in and early-stage advisor to dozens of tech companies, including Invite Media (acquired by Google in 2010), MediaMath, Dstillery and Solve Media. He has been honored by Crain’s 40 Under 40, Adweek 50, Silicon Alley 100, and was recognized as an E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year in the New York region in 2012. He earned a BSE in computer science from Princeton University in 1999.
For more about entrepreneurship at Princeton, visit http://kellercenter.princeton.edu/
PRINCETON ENTREPRENEURS
Executive Producers:
John Danner
Chris Kuenne ‘85
Derek Lidow ‘73
Ed Zschau ‘61
Editorial Director:
Teresa Riordan
Video Editors:
Evelyn Tu
Ben Abrams
Technical Consultant:
Delaney Granizo-Mackenzie ‘14
Special thanks: Christina Caraco
Brian O'Kelley is CEO and co-founder of AppNexus, the world’s largest independent ad tech company. Before founding AppNexus, O’Kelley was chief technology officer of Right Media, where his team invented the first online ad exchange. Right Media sold to Yahoo! in 2007 for $850 million.
O’Kelley, who has been called “the new king of ad tech,” credits past failures with his current success. Failure, he says “was the only way to really quickly learn and build skills that would allow me, once I was in the right place at the right time, to actually be successful. I think the biggest risk for an entrepreneur is often that if you are successful for the wrong reasons – like if you get lucky – then when hard times come or the business grows, you don’t have the next set of skills you need to overcome those challenges.”
O’Kelley is an active investor in and early-stage advisor to dozens of tech companies, including Invite Media (acquired by Google in 2010), MediaMath, Dstillery and Solve Media. He has been honored by Crain’s 40 Under 40, Adweek 50, Silicon Alley 100, and was recognized as an E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year in the New York region in 2012. He earned a BSE in computer science from Princeton University in 1999.
For more about entrepreneurship at Princeton, visit http://kellercenter.princeton.edu/
PRINCETON ENTREPRENEURS
Executive Producers:
John Danner
Chris Kuenne ‘85
Derek Lidow ‘73
Ed Zschau ‘61
Editorial Director:
Teresa Riordan
Video Editors:
Evelyn Tu
Ben Abrams
Technical Consultant:
Delaney Granizo-Mackenzie ‘14
Special thanks: Christina Caraco
![Brian OKelley: Appnexus [Princeton Entrepreneurs]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/rHmabtbrGsM/mqdefault.jpg "Brian OKelley: Appnexus [Princeton Entrepreneurs]
Brian OKelley is CEO and co-founder of AppNexus, the world’s largest independent ad tech company. Before founding AppNexus, O’Kelley was chief technology officer of Right Media, where his team invented the first online ad exchange. Right Media sold to Yahoo! in 2007 for $850 million.
O’Kelley, who has been called “the new king of ad tech,” credits past failures with his current success. Failure, he says “was the only way to really quickly learn and build skills that would allow me, once I was in the right place at the right time, to actually be successful. I think the biggest risk for an entrepreneur is often that if you are successful for the wrong reasons – like if you get lucky – then when hard times come or the business grows, you don’t have the next set of skills you need to overcome those challenges.”
O’Kelley is an active investor in and early-stage advisor to dozens of tech companies, including Invite Media (acquired by Google in 2010), MediaMath, Dstillery and Solve Media. He has been honored by Crain’s 40 Under 40, Adweek 50, Silicon Alley 100, and was recognized as an E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year in the New York region in 2012. He earned a BSE in computer science from Princeton University in 1999.
For more about entrepreneurship at Princeton, visit http://kellercenter.princeton.edu/
PRINCETON ENTREPRENEURS
Executive Producers:
John Danner
Chris Kuenne ‘85
Derek Lidow ‘73
Ed Zschau ‘61
Editorial Director:
Teresa Riordan
Video Editors:
Evelyn Tu
Ben Abrams
Technical Consultant:
Delaney Granizo-Mackenzie ‘14
Special thanks: Christina Caraco")
