Founders
Shan-Lyn Ma
Nobu Nakaguchi
About
In 2013, we founded Zola with Shan-Lyn Ma and Nobu Nakaguchi. Zola supports couples from engagement into newlywed life by combining compassionate customer service with smart technology. At the time, the wedding industry, which is valued at $100B in the US alone, was extremely antiquated and fragmented, with no clear business leader. The idea was to support the entire wedding life stage by building digitally native products that are interconnected and magical. Zola’s first product was a universal wedding registry, powered by proprietary marketplace technology.
Today Zola’s wedding registry is the fastest growing in the country, with over 1,000 brand partners such as KitchenAid, Le Creuset, Airbnb, and Crate and Barrel. The company has strategically evolved to become synonymous with weddings by launching beautiful wedding websites, matching wedding paper, a wedding boutique, honeymoons, and more. And, the company has been recognized many times over such as by the Wall Street Journal as a Top 25 Tech Company to Watch and by Fast Company as a Most Innovative Company. Zola has become the clear leader of the industry because of the company’s beloved brand, superior business model, and highly passionate base of over 1 million couples. Zola has raised over $190M to date.
