About Safa/SRnext

Safa Rashtchy is currently an angel investor and advisor, and sits on the boards of several start-ups.  Safa was most recently a Managing Director,  Senior Research Analyst focused on Internet media and marketing, and the Lead China analyst at Piper Jaffray and Company. He joined Piper Jaffray in 1997 and led the firm’s expansion efforts in the Internet industry and, most notably, in expansion to China.  Safa has published numerous research and industry reports on Online Advertising, Search, Chinese Internet market, and other segments of Internet Media and Technology.  In 2007, Safa and his team published the ground breaking report on media and advertising, entitled, “The User Revolution – The New Advertising Ecosystem and the Rise of The Internet as a Mass Medium.”  The 400+ page report outlined key emerging themes that are changing the media and advertising world and also provided a major reference book for the online advertising industry, covering all aspects of the market with in-depth discussion and analysis.  In addition to the User Revolution, Safa’s regular weekly newsletter at Piper Jaffray, The Silk Road, was one of the most widely read and respected research publications in the industry. Safa is a frequent keynote speaker at select industry conferences in the U.S, Europe and Asia.

Awards and Recognition. Throughout his ten year tenure at Piper, Safa enjoyed top ranking and recognition from Wall Street, including three consecutive years of the prestigious Institutional Investor (II) ranking, as well as top rankings for stock picks and earnings estimates.  In 2007, Safa was named the Investment Analyst of the Year and received the 2007 New Economy Award from iResearch in China.  Safa was also named the Top Earnings Estimator for his sector by South China Morning Post and Starmine in 2007.  In 2002, Safa was named to The Wall Street Journal’s ” Best on the Street” analyst survey and was also a winner in Institutional Investor magazine’s “Home Run Hitters of 2001″ top stock pickers list.  Safa has been quoted regularly in many top publications, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Time, BusinessWeek, and Fortune, and he has made regular appearances on CNBC, PBS and other networks. While at Piper, Safa developed his research coverage with a focus on online advertising, search and e-commerce, and China research. Safa’s research in online search has been the most extensive in the industry and he is often considered an authority on search. He has been on the advisory board of Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) since 2004.

Safa retired from Piper Jaffray in June 2007, after ten years as a sell-side analyst. Prior to Piper, Safa held a number of industry positions. From 1992 to 1996, Safa was president of ColorWorks Graphics, the digital imaging company he founded in Boston. Prior to that, Safa worked in various technical and management capacities in computer graphics and engineering companies. Safa holds a Master’s degree in business administration, summa cum laude, from Boston University and a Bachelor’s degree in engineering from Purdue University.