Born and raised in California, Zak put aside his childhood dream of becoming a professional racing driver to develop his skills within motorsport's business and commercial worlds. In 1995, he founded JMI, which grew to become the largest and most successful motorsport marketing agency in the world. When JMI was acquired by CSM, a division of Chime Communications, in 2013, Brown became the company's Chief Executive Officer. He then relinquished that post to embark on his journey at McLaren in the winter of 2016 as Executive Director of McLaren Technology Group.