To be proud of...

Anousheh Ansari is co-founder and CEO of Telecom Technologies, Inc. (TTI). Along with her brother-in-law Amir Ansari, she made a multi-million contribution to the X-Prize foundation on May 5, 2004, the 43rd anniversary of Alan Shepard's sub-orbital spaceflight. The X-Prize was officially renamed the Ansari X Prize in honour of their donation.

Born in 1967 in Tehran, Iran, Ansari witnessed the Iranian revolution in 1979. She emigrated to the United States in 1984 at the age of sixteen and received her bachelor's of science in electrical engineering and computer science at George Mason University. She received her master's degree at George Washington University.

Ansari, along with her husband Hamid and brother-in-law Amir, founded TTI in 1993. The company was acquired by Sonus Networks, Inc. in 2000. Ansari was listed in Fortune magazine's "40 under 40" list in 2001 and honoured by Working Woman magazine as the winner of the 2000 National Entrepreneurial Excellence award.

Most recently, Prodea has announced the formation of a partnership with Space Adventures, Ltd. and the Federal Space Agency of the Russian Federation (FSA) to create a fleet of suborbital spaceflight vehicles (the Space Adventures Explorer) for global commercial use.

It was reported on March 16, 2006 that Anousheh Ansari was in training for a Soyuz flight to the International Space Station, a report which was later denied by Space Adventures. If she indeed flies, Ansari would be the first female space tourist and the first Iranian in space. In May 2006, it was reported that she was one of the two possible choices, along with Charles Simonyi, for the seat available on board Soyuz TMA-10 in early 2007.