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The Resource Center has all the info you'll need From content to user feedback, the resource center has the information you need for every level of the entrepreneurial process.
Vinod grew up dreaming of being an entrepreneur. He was raised in an Indian Army household with no business or technology connections. When, at age 16, he first heard about Intel, he dreamt of starting his own technology company. Upon graduating with a Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, he tried to start a soy milk company to service the many people in India who did not have refrigerators. He then came to the US and got his Masters in Biomedical Engineering at Carnegie-Mellon University. His startup dreams attracted him to Silicon Valley where he got an MBA at Stanford University in 1980. In 1982, Khosla started Sun Microsystems to build workstations for software developers. At Sun he pioneered "open systems" and RISC processors. Sun was funded by long time friend and board member John Doerr of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. In 1986 he switched sides and joined Kleiner Perkins where he was a general partner. There, he worked with Nexgen/AMD, Juniper, Excite, and many other ventures. In 2004, Khosla formed Khosla Ventures. Khosla Ventures offers venture assistance, strategic advice and capital to entrepreneurs. The firm helps entrepreneurs extend the potential of their ideas in both traditional venture areas like the Internet, computing, mobile, and silicon technology arenas but also supports breakthrough scientific work in clean technology areas such as bio-refineries for energy and bioplastics, solar, battery and other environmentally friendly technologies.
While Plan A may begin the backbone on which an entrepreneurial idea is hinged, succinct data gathering and constant market evaluation more often lead to profit with the next idea in line. The tech sector breeds innovation, says KPCB partner and frequent speaker Randy Komisar, and to do so it is required to accept the numerous fits and starts of the start-up.
Randy Komisar joined Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers in 2005 as a partner. For several years prior Randy has partnered with entrepreneurs creating businesses with leading edge technologies. He was a co-founder of Claris Corporation, served as CEO for LucasArts Entertainment and Crystal Dynamics, and acted as a "virtual CEO" for such companies as WebTV, Mirra and GlobalGiving. He was a founding Director of TiVo where he is currently chairman of the Nominating and Governance Committee. Earlier Randy served as CFO of GO Corporation and Senior Counsel for Apple Computer, following a private practice in Technology Law. Randy holds a BA in Economics from Brown University and a JD form Harvard Law School. He is a Consulting Professor of Entrepreneurship at Stanford University and author of the best-selling book The Monk and the Riddle, as well as several articles on leadership and entrepreneurship. Randy frequently speaks here and abroad on such topics.
Dunn is currently an Advisor to Social Ventures around the world and an Associate Consulting Professor at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (a.k.a d.school) at Stanford University. She left Hewlett-Packard in June, 2005 after 22 years, the last three years of which were spent as Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs and Global Citizenship. In that role, she led HP's efforts on corporate social and environmental responsibility, government and public affairs, and corporate philanthropy. Through the efforts of Debra's team, HP received widespread recognition and numerous global awards for leadership in Global Corporate Citizenship. She was elected an HP vice president in November 1999, and she was named general manager of HP's executive committee in 1998, leading the Agilent spin-off process. Dunn holds a BA in comparative economics from Brown University, and an MBA from Harvard School of Business. She serves on the Boards of the Skoll Foundation, B Lab, Global Giving, and the Faculty of Sustainability.
Wendy Kopp, Teach For America's CEO and founder, is driven to end educational inequity across the nation. In this seminar, Kopp shares her entrepreneurial story of starting Teach For America straight out of college, and articulates the sense of urgency that she and her organization still feel for producing fundamental changes to education in America.
Katharine Ku is Director of the Office of Technology Licensing (OTL) at Stanford University. OTL is responsible for the licensing of various state-of-the-art university technologies and industry sponsored research agreements and collaborations. In fiscal year 2003-2004, OTL received $49.5 Million from the licensing of over 435 different technologies. From 1994-98, in addition to her OTL responsibilities, Ku was responsible for Stanford's Sponsored Projects Office, which handled $500M in research contracts and grants. Ku was Vice President, Business Development at Protein Design Labs, Inc. in Mountain View, California from 1990-1991. Prior to PDL, Ku spent 12 years at Stanford in various positions, was a researcher at Monsanto and Sigma Chemical, administered a dialysis clinical trial at University of California and taught chemistry and basic engineering courses. Ku has been active in the Licensing Executive Society (LES), serving as Vice President, Western Region and Trustee of LES and various committee chairs. She also has served as President of the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) from 1988-90. She received the AUTM 2001 Bayh-Dole Award for her efforts in university licensing. Ku has a B.S. Chemical Engineering (Cornell University), an M.S. in Chem. Eng. (Washington University) and is a registered patent agent.
Lisa Lambert, Vice President at Intel Capital, speaks at length on the experience of working for a mammoth, corporate-backed strategic venture capital firm. She unpacks the challenges of the post-recession VC world, and speaks at length about the industry at large. In addition, Lambert discusses critical issues of work/life balance and the conundrum of personal choices faced when climbing the corporate ladder.
Chris Larsen is Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Prosper. For over a decade Chris Larsen has focused on using the Internet to make consumer lending more efficient, fair, honest, open, and trustworthy. Prior to Prosper, Mr. Larsen co-founded and served as Chairman and CEO of E-LOAN. Under Mr. Larsen's leadership, E-LOAN closed over $27 billion in consumer loans, and was consistently ranked as one of the nation's most trusted consumer brands. E-LOAN earned consumers' trust by taking radically pro-consumer actions such as being the first company to provide consumers with access to their credit scores, and playing a critical role in the passage of the strongest consumer financial privacy protection law in the nation. Mr. Larsen led E-LOAN through a successful IPO in 1999, and oversaw the company's acquisition by Popular, Inc. in 2005. Mr. Larsen holds an M.B.A. degree from Stanford University and a B.S. degree from San Francisco State University, where he was named the 2004 Alumnus of the Year.
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