The CEO of Phoenix-based MobiSquad plans to open up shop in Boston next year and he doesn't want Patriots [team stats] fans to hold it against him that he let his buddy Brandon Lloyd jump a moving car in an ad for the company.
"Brandon was in no harm at any time during the jump," MobiSquad's Nate Reis told the Herald. "We didn't use a green screen, but let's just say I've got a really great camera team and video editing team. Brandon really did jump that high, but my plan was not to have a viral video of him bouncing off a car."
A Wisconsin native, Reis has spent some time in Boston where he attended Harvard Business School's Owner/President Management program — along with classmate Tyra Banks — and graduated last March.
"It's an MBA from a CEO's perspective," said Reis. "There really is no entrepreneur school, but being there you really learn a lot from class and — living in the dorms — from your classmates. It was life-changing."
Reis said he met Lloyd, now a Patriots wide receiver, through mutual friends about three years ago when the then-Denver Bronco was in Phoenix working out at a training facility. The two have been pals ever since.
"He's really a great guy with a big heart, a total class act," said Reis. "He's also brilliant."
That would not be evident from the MobiSquad video, which appears to show Lloyd jumping over a purple MobiSquad Smartcar while it zooms toward him at 35 mph. Don't try this at home — because it's not real, though the video was done well enough to fool 12 percent of Herald readers in a bostonherald.com poll and another 31 percent thought it might be legit.
As for MobiSquad, the boot-strapped company employs 110 in Austin, Salt Lake City and Seattle where its techs drive around in purple Smartcars to help small business owners connect with mobile payment systems.
