Mark Cuban

Mark Cuban is an American businessman, entrepreneur, and television personality. He is widely recognized as a former principal owner and current minority owner of the Dallas Mavericks of the National Basketball Association (NBA), a co-owner of 2929 Entertainment, and a longtime shark investor on the ABC reality television series Shark Tank.

Cuban was born on July 31, 1958, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up in the suburb of Mt. Lebanon in a working-class Jewish family. His father worked as an automobile upholsterer, while his mother held various job goals. Cuban demonstrated an early aptitude for business, selling garbage bags, stamps, and coins as a youth, and running newspapers from Cleveland during a Pittsburgh publishing strike. Bypassing his senior year of high school, he enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh before transferring to Indiana University's Kelley School of Business, where he graduated in 1981 with a degree in management.

After graduating, Cuban worked for Mellon Bank before relocating to Dallas, Texas, in 1982. Following short stints as a bartender and software salesperson, he co-founded MicroSolutions, a computer systems integrator that he sold to CompuServe in 1990 for $6 million. In 1995, Cuban joined Audionet, which transitioned into Broadcast.com in 1998. During the dot-com era, Broadcast.com grew rapidly and was acquired by Yahoo! in 1999 for $5.7 billion in stock, a transaction that made Cuban a billionaire prior to the service's eventual discontinuation.

Cuban subsequently diversified his investments into media, entertainment, and sports. Alongside partner Todd Wagner, he established 2929 Entertainment, acquiring Landmark Theatres, producing a revived television broadcast of Star Search, and releasing the film Bubble. He also became the owner of film distributor Magnolia Pictures. In sports, Cuban became a high-profile figure in the NBA through his leadership of the Dallas Mavericks, guiding the franchise through its 2011 NBA championship victory and engaging in notable disputes with league officials.

In 2011, Cuban joined the cast of Shark Tank, ultimately backing dozens of startup companies across numerous episodes during his tenure. His broader venture investments have spanned technology, digital media, and software platforms, including Red Swoosh, Weblogs, Inc., IceRocket, Motionloft, ZenBusiness, and cryptocurrency assets such as Dogecoin. Additionally, he authored the motivational e-book How to Win at the Sport of Business and created investigative reporting platforms such as Sharesleuth.com and Bailoutsleuth.com.

In January 2022, Cuban launched Cost Plus Drugs alongside radiologist Alex Oshmyansky to provide transparent, direct-to-consumer pricing on generic prescription medications in the United States. He announced partnerships for the pharmacy venture with TrumpRx and Humana in 2025. As of January 2026, Forbes estimated his net worth to be $6 billion.