Maurice Kanbar

Inventor and Author

Maurice Kanbar has been inventing new products since his twenties, driven by an insatiable curiosity. He made his mark as an inventor of such unrelated gadgets as the D-Fuzz It Sweater Comb and cryogenic cataract remover and the conceptualizer of the multiplex cinema and Tangoes puzzle game. Mr. Kanbar is and always has been profoundly inquisitive, with a boundless enthusiasm for the physics and mechanics that govern everyday life.

When Mr. Kanbar decided to launch his new "hangover-free" vodka by himself, his peers told him he was crazy. Eight years and millions of dollars later, Mr. Kanbar's SKYY Vodka has sold over four million cases, becoming one of the fastest growing brands in the world. "If someone tells me it can't be done," Maurice says, "I push that much more to see if I can do it. I try to be actively engaged - with my work, with everything. It's the only way I know how to do things. I'm persistent."

Within the last year, Mr. Kanbar published a book of advice for would-be inventors, Secrets from an Inventor's Notebook. In Secrets, Kanbar uses his own real-life hits and misses as a user-friendly blueprint for the inventing process.

Mr. Kanbar's many remarkable successes have enabled him to donate generously to numerous causes, including a $6 million donation to NYU. He is a renowned supporter of the arts, especially independent film. He is donating all author royalties from his new book to a scholarship fund.

A native of Brooklyn, New York, Maurice Kanbar lives in San Francisco and New York.

<< back to honorees