Ryan Simonetti

Ryan Simonetti is the CEO and co-founder of Convene, a tech-enabled hospitality brand that partners with progressive organizations to create premium places to meet, work and host inspiring events. His unique expertise in real estate, development, and finance has helped catapult Convene to become a pioneer in the commercial real estate industry.

Ryan co-founded Convene in 2009 with the intention of disrupting the commercial real estate industry and transforming the workplace experience by capitalizing on converging trends in real estate, technology, and hospitality. His vision – to infuse hotel-style services into meetings, events and flexible office spaces – has been Convene’s guiding force for the last 11 years, during which they have expanded to 25 locations across the US and UK.

With Ryan at the helm, Convene has raised $410M in funding to date, and has been named one of America’s 100 Most Promising Companies by Forbes and a Best Workplace by both Inc. and Fortune Magazine. Ryan has been recognized for his transformative achievements on Real Estate Forum’s 50 Under 40 list, Inc. Magazine’s “30 Under 30,” a list of America’s Most Promising Young Entrepreneurs, was named “Top Entrepreneur” by Crain’s New York, and a finalist in Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year® New York Awards.

Ryan, the first in his family to attend college, graduated from Villanova University, where he developed the concepts for and ran several “start-up” companies designed for students. His professional career began as a real estate banking analyst in the global real estate group at Lehman Brothers, where he focused on the structuring and securitization of commercial mortgage-backed securities. Following Lehman Brothers, Ryan joined Gramercy Capital Corp. as a vice president where he was responsible for the restructuring of a billion dollar loan portfolio including $600 million of hospitality related real estate investments.

Ryan is an active supporter of the Urban Land Institute, CoreNet Global, the RPA and was selected to be a member of New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand’s Small Business Working Group. In addition, he is an active venture investor and advisor to a number of start-up technology companies and their founders. Outside of work, he enjoys golfing, fishing, reading and thinking of the next ‘big idea.’ Ryan and his wife Lisa live in New York with their children Riley and Harley.