<![CDATA[Gawker: valleywag, gisel hiscock]]> http://tags.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/gawker.com.png <![CDATA[Gawker: valleywag, gisel hiscock]]> http://gawker.com/tag/valleywag/giselhiscock http://gawker.com/tag/valleywag/giselhiscock <![CDATA[Google Billionaire Ex-Wife's Revenge Wedding]]> What did the ex-wife of Google executive Omid Kordestani (net worth: $2.2 billion) do after getting dumped for a younger woman? She hooked up with a doctor and hired Julio Iglesias as her wedding singer.

Iglesias — whose private-performance fee is estimated at $1 million — was only the start of the bills for the wedding, held last weekend at the Marquis Cabo San Lucas hotel.

Kordestani's ex, Bita Daryabari, and her groom, vascular surgeon Reza Malek (pictured above, at a charity event in San Francisco), stayed in a $4,000/night presidential suite. Colin Cowie, the celebrity wedding planner who's seen Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Jennifer Lopez, and others to the altar, organized the nuptials. Some of the guests took chartered planes Daryabari and Malek paid for. A tequila party on the beach ended with fireworks; the last fusillade took the form of a heart. A chef was flown in from New York to cater the affair. Paparazzi, in town to lens Jennifer Aniston, stumbled across the event — which, in a way, only added to its gaudy glamour.

It is hard to imagine a worse time to throw an extravagant wedding. But Daryabari surely had other things on her mind.

What turned Daryabari, a telecom executive turned philanthropist, into a towering Bridezilla? Her husband, Kordestani, was Google's 12th employee and its first salesman. He struck a search-licensing deal with the now-forgotten Netscape, then an Internet powerhouse where he previously worked, that made Google viable. Google's IPO made Kordestani wealthy, and as Google's shares soared, his fortune grew into the billions of dollars.

But then Kordestani fell in love with a coworker, Gisel Hiscock (right, and yes, that's really her name, poor dear). A rumored reconciliation after the revelation of his affair never happened. The couple moved to London last summer. Somewhere along the line, Daryabari and Kordestani finalized their divorce.

Which, naturally, gave her a big chunk of Kordestani's Google fortune. And what better way to rub her ex-husband's face in her happiness than by spending his money, a million dollars at a time, on the most extravagant event imaginable? If it weren't a supremely arrogant Googler, the self-crowned king of the new advertising world, getting his comeuppance, we might say her wedding was in poor taste. But is there a sweeter taste than revenge?

(Photo by Drew Altizer via SFLuxe)

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<![CDATA[Google sales chief and his Googler lover moving to the U.K.]]> Omid Kordestani, the globe-trotting head of sales for Google, is moving to the U.K. with his family. But which family? Gisel Hiscock, his Google-employed lover, has been seen at his arm at parties recently. She started a new London-based position working for Google in business development last month. Kordestani and his wife, Bita Daryabari, had long planned to move their children to Europe for a year or two, though lately they've been on the rocks. So are she and the kids coming, too? He travels so much that it barely matters where he hangs his hat. But the logistics seem so complicated! There must be some secret Google Web-based app Kordestani is beta-testing that helps him track his personal life.

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<![CDATA[Google sales chief, wife to reconcile?]]> Yahoo president Sue Decker isn't the only Valley executive with a troubled marriage. Commenters are still talking about our report three weeks ago that Google sales chief Omid Kordestani's relationship with his wife, Bita Daryabari, was on the rocks. Rumors are flying: One commenter says Gisel Hiscock, the New York-based Google finance executive with whom Kordestani's been carrying on an affair, is moving to Mountain View to be closer to Kordestani. Others contend that Kordestani and Daryabari are reconciling, and that he hasn't even moved out. My question: Why are so many people outside this marriage emotionally invested in it? Kordestani is hailed as a hero inside the Googleplex for building Google's multibillion-dollar advertising business from scratch. Daryabari is active in politics and philanthropy. Still, that doesn't seem to explain the obsessive level of interest in this heretofore obscure couple.

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<![CDATA[Billionaire Google sales exec's in-house romance]]> Affairs of the heart are never easy for outsiders to understand. But when they stray into the office, they, alas, become everyone's business. Which is why we asked, a while back, which Googler had put his marriage at risk over an affair with a coworker. As commenter notelling correctly guessed after we ran a blind item, it's Omid Kordestani, Google's top sales executive. Kordestani's no mere sales guy, however. For one, he's worth $2.2 billion, thanks to his Google shares. And inside the Googleplex, he's referred to as the company's "business founder," responsible for the fabulously successful money machine that is AdWords. With his stunningly beautiful and intelligent wife, Bita, shown above to the left, Kordestani might seem to have it all. But all was not enough.



Gisel HiscockKordestani's new love, as is widely known within Google, is Gisel Hiscock, a New York-based finance director for the company.

Before you commenters say it, allow me: Yes, her last name is singularly unfortunate. But since Hiscock joined Google in 2003, before its lucrative IPO, it's unlikely that she's after Kordestani for his money. One imagines she might be more interested in obtaining a new surname.

But back to business. One tipster describes Hiscock's role as "sales finance," a group that now reports to Google's CFO, not Kordestani. Hiscock, however, has been at Google since 2003, and at one point sales finance reported to Kordestani. It's not clear when the affair began, but it's possible that Hiscock was Kordestani's employee at the time. And Kordestani, given his importance to the company, holds unspoken authority within Google that reaches beyond his direct line of command.

Even then, Google's published code of conduct is silent on the propriety of romantic relationships between employees, even when there's a reporting relationship. So it's possible Kordestani and Hiscock did absolutely nothing against the rules. Except for this part:

One way to consider whether a given action, relationship, gift, etc. constitutes a conflict of interest is to imagine you are at a company meeting. Could you justify your actions in front of your peers?
Imagine if Kordestani were ever called on to explain his relationship with Hiscock? CEO Eric Schmidt, Google's adulterer supervision, might be all too understanding. But the rest of Google?]]>
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