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LendingTree, Inc. introduced Monday its founder and CEO Doug Lebda died unexpectedly in an all-terrain automobile accident over the weekend.
The board has appointed LendingTree’s Chief Working Officer and President, Scott Peyree, to succeed Lebda, efficient instantly.
“We’re deeply saddened by the sudden passing of Doug. Doug was a visionary chief whose relentless drive, innovation and fervour reworked the monetary providers panorama, touching the lives of hundreds of thousands of customers,” the board of administrators stated in an announcement.
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The board stated Lebda “devoted himself to constructing an organization rooted in client empowerment, championing a mission to simplify monetary selections and fostering financial alternative for all” since its founding in 1996.
Douglas “Doug” Lebda, chief government officer of LendingTree Inc., pauses throughout a Bloomberg Tv interview in New York, U.S., on Tuesday, March 8, 2016. (Chris Goodney/Bloomberg through Getty Photos / Getty Photos)
LendingTree is among the nation’s largest on-line monetary platforms, offering affords for loans, bank cards, insurance coverage, and extra by means of a community of roughly 430 monetary companions. Lebda, who graduated from Bucknell College and earned his MBA from the College of Virginia’s Darden College of Enterprise, was with the corporate for 26 years.
He based the corporate with the aim of simplifying the loan-shopping course of by creating an internet site that took the legwork out of working to a number of banks for data.
“As an alternative of bodily going to a number of banks, prospects may go to an internet site the place the banks would compete for his or her enterprise,” LendingTree’s web site reads.
After launching nationally in July 1998, he led LendingTree by means of its IPO in 2000, the dot-com meltdown of 2001 and a sale to IAC/InterActiveCorp in 2003.
Between 2005 and 2008, Lebda served as IAC’s President and Chief Working Officer, and in 2008, joined the newly shaped Tree.com, which rebranded as LendingTree, because it spun out from IAC as a separate public firm. Earlier than the of founding LendingTree, Lebda labored as an auditor and marketing consultant for PriceWaterhouseCoopers.
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In an announcement, Peyree stated Lebda’s passing was devastating, “however probably the most instant impacts of his legacy is the robust administration workforce he put in place at LendingTree. I stay up for main our workforce and persevering with the shared imaginative and prescient Doug and I labored towards for the longer term.”
The board stated it’s going to work carefully with Peyree to honor Lebda’s imaginative and prescient, emphasizing that the corporate is “dedicated to upholding his legacy and persevering with the work he started with ardour, integrity, and dedication.”
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Lead unbiased director, Steve Ozonian, will function the chairman of the board efficient instantly. Ozonian joined the Board in 2008.
Ozonian thanked Peyree for his “excellent dedication and focus” on the firm and expressed confidence in his “capability to proceed main LendingTree into the longer term.”

Buyer utilizing a bank card. (Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Photos / Getty Photos)
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Shares of the corporate’s inventory fell on the information of Lebda’s loss of life.