Doug Dohring

Doug Dohring founded Neopets Inc. after buying Neopets.com from Adam Powell and Donna Williams in February 2000. Mr. Dohring was Chairman and CEO of the company through June 2005, when he sold Neopets to Viacom (owners of Nickelodeon and MTV as well as many other channels) for $160 million. He continued to serve as CEO of Neopets until September 2006 at the request of Viacom management to complete a successful transition to a new MTV Networks management team. NeoPets and Mr. Dohring were the subject of a Harvard Business School Case Study.

Doug Dohring left Neopets to found the education technology company Age of Learning in February 2007. As Neopets was, the company is based in Glendale, California. Doug Dohring and Age of Learning launched ABCmouse.com Early Learning Academy in 2010. Still owned by Doug Dohring, Age of Learning raised $150 million in 2016, giving the company a $1 billion valuation.

Doug Dohring's first successful company was the marketing research firm called The Dohring Company. Based in Glendale, California, The Dohring Company became a top-100 US market research firm and the nation’s largest provider of custom market research to the retail automotive industry. Some of the websites owned by The Dohring Company include OpinionSurveys.com, RestaurantSurveys.com, and SatisfactionSurveys.com. In 2004, OpinionSurveys.com was acquired by Greenfield Online, a NASDAQ-listed public company and one of the largest market research firms in the country at the time (later acquired by Microsoft). Doug Dohring was the owner of Digital Lightwave for a very short period.