Digital media CEO Farhan Lalani gets Forty under 40 nod

Business in Vancouver's Forty Under 40 hitnewsstands Tuesday. The annual list celebrates the young entrepreneurs, executives and professionals who are driving business in the city.

Farhan Lalani is one of this year's honorees. The 37-year-old is President and CEO of Market One Media Group, an innovative digital media firm.

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"It's a great honour, I'm very excited about it," Lalani said about the top 40 nod.

He saysit's especially exciting for his parents who came to Canada in 1972 as refugees. They had been living in Uganda when their properties and assets were taken away under the Idi Amin government.

Once in Canada, his parents started again from scratch.

"From my childhood, we grew up with not a lot to start off with. But the one thing I can say for [my parents] is they were educated and so that made the transition a lot easier."

Lalani entered the workforce after university as an analyst for mining companies when gold was at a high in the market. Then, after years of working in capital markets, he got into helping companies get investor attention through media coverage.

"I started working locally with some of the local papers," he said.

"We started doing sponsored content pieces for public companies and I did one and I did two, and then people were knocking down my door saying 'how do we do this?'"

It wasn't long before Lalani was making deals will larger media companies, such asPostmedia and Bell.

"I feel like this digital media space has awoken me. It's just been so fascinating to see the changes and the trends that are taking place in the media space."

To hear more from Lalani, click the link: Digital media CEO Farhan Lalani featured in Forty under 40 series