to page content
to site navigation
The Foundation's primary site.
Global news, events, and resources.
The national learning program for entrepreneurs.
A new approach to developing the next generation of high-growth firms.
Access to university research and innovation.
The Kauffman Foundation's charter school serving Kansas City.
Encouraging the aspirations of young people.
The platform for business plan competitions.
College preparation and access for urban youth in Kansas City.
A guide to Kauffman Foundation and partner resources, for aspiring entrepreneurs.
News and announcements from the Foundation.
From our vice president of Entrepreneurship.
From our vice president of Advancing Innovation.
News from Global Entrepreneurship Week
News about this education program for entrepreneurs.
Tweets for the eMed Community at Entrepreneurship.org
News from the Kauffman Labs program.
From our business plan competition service.
Contribute to the community seeking to improve entrepreneurship and innovation measurement.
A look at entrepreneurship from the Kauffman Foundation's Thom Ruhe.
Tracks research and policies that are accelerating economic growth and changing the world.
Brings to light various policies and initiatives to advance innovation and drive economic growth.
A selection of our videos
Take our video and audio with you.
Explore many of our publications.
Join the discussion on our LinkedIn site.
Join us on Google's social service.
Focused on the entrepreneurial world As the designated video channel for entrepreneurship, the e360TV Channel features content focused on important topics that are impacting the world of entrepreneurship as we know it.
Carol Bartz is executive chairman of the board of Autodesk, Inc. Bartz was chairman, president and CEO of Autodesk for 14 years and stepped-down in April, 2006. During her tenure, the company diversified its product line and grew revenues from $285 million to $1.523 billion in FY06. Bartz previously held positions at Sun Microsystems, 11 years ago serving as vice president of worldwide field operations and an executive officer of the company. Before joining Sun, she held product line and sales management positions at Digital Equipment Corporation and 3M Corporation. Appointed to President Bush's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, Bartz is one of a select group of industry leaders expected to play a key role in shaping and setting the government's high tech agenda-ranging from R&D funding to new broadband incentives. She also serves on the Board of Directors of BEA Systems, Cisco Systems, Network Appliance, and the Foundation for the National Medals of Science and Technology. Bartz holds an honors degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin. She was granted an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the New Jersey Institute of Technology, an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from William Woods University.
Tom Byers is a professor at Stanford University where he focuses on high-technology entrepreneurship education. He is founder and a faculty director of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), which serves as the entrepreneurship center for the engineering school. STVP includes the Mayfield Fellows work/study program, Educators Corner website of teaching resources, and global Roundtable on Entrepreneurship Education conferences. Tom is also a faculty director of the AEA/Stanford Executive Institute, a general management program for technology executives. Tom is co-author of the textbook called "Technology Ventures: From Idea to Enterprise" (McGraw-Hill, 2005). Tom also holds a visiting professor appointment at the London Business School and University College London. Tom currently serves as a director on the boards of Reactivity and Flywheel Ventures. In addition, he serves on advisory boards or committees of the American Society for Engineering Education's Entrepreneurship Division, Harvard Business School's California Research Center, and the National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE) for inner-city youth. Previously, Tom lectured at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. Tom has a range of business experience including executive vice president of Symantec Corporation and founder/president of Slate Corporation. Tom started his professional career at Accenture. For his efforts at Stanford, Tom holds an endowed chair known as the McCoy University Fellow in Undergraduate Education. Tom was given the 2005 Gores Award for excellence in teaching (the university's highest award) and the 2002 Tau Beta Pi Award for excellence in undergraduate teaching (the engineering school's highest award). He is a recipient of three recent national teaching awards: the 2005 ASEE Kauffman Award for excellence in engineering and technology entrepreneurship
Jeff Hawkins is the Founder of Numenta, but he is also well known as the co-founder of two companies, Palm and Handspring, and as the architect of many computing products, such as the PalmPilot and the Treo smartphone. Throughout his life Hawkins has also had a deep interest in neuroscience and theories of the neocortex. His interest in the brain led him to create the non-profit Redwood Neuroscience Institute (RNI), a scientific organization focused on understanding how the human neocortex processes information. While at RNI, Hawkins developed a theory of neocortex which appeared in his 2004 book, On Intelligence. Along with Dileep George and Donna Dubinsky, Hawkins founded Numenta in 2005 to develop a technology platform derived from his theory. It is his hope that Numenta will play a catalytic role in creating an industry based on this theory and technology. Jeff Hawkins earned his B.S. in electrical engineering from Cornell University in 1979. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2003.
Peter A. Seligmann is one of today's most dynamic leaders in the global conservation movement, where he has brought innovation and action to the forefront of biodiversity protection for more than 25 years. In 1987, he co-founded Conservation International, and as Chairman and CEO he has positioned CI at the cutting edge of conservation, creating lasting solutions to biodiversity and sustainable development challenges. Seligmann holds a masters degree from Yale University's School of Forestry and Environmental Science and an honorary Doctorate in Science from Michigan State University. In 2001, he was awarded the Order of the Golden Ark from the Netherlands. Seligmann serves on the board of the Wild Salmon Center in Portland, Oregon, and the Mayor's Environmental Council in Washington, D.C. He also serves on several corporate boards, as well as on the advisory councils of the Jackson Hole Land Trust, Ecotrust and other not-for-profit organizations, including the Japanese Keidanren's Nature Conservation Fund. In 2000, President Clinton named him a member of the Enterprise for the Americas Board. Seligmann's work has been featured by ABC's "Nightline," CNN and Fortune Magazine. A strong advocate of building partnerships, Seligmann has forged groundbreaking joint projects between the environmental community and other sectors, including government and industry. In 1998, CI established the Center for Applied Biodiversity Science, and in 2001, the Center for Environmental Leadership in Business. In 2000, CI launched the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund in collaboration with the World Bank and the MacArthur Foundation. Under Seligmann's leadership, CI has pioneered conservation tools that are economically sound, scientifically based and culturally sensitive. He has guided CI to become a major international conservation leader, with field offices in more than 30 countries, and major influences
John Doerr joined Intel in 1974 just as they invented the famous "8080" 8 bit microprocessor. At Intel, he held various engineering, marketing and management assignments, and was one of their top-ranked sales executives. In 1980, he joined Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and sponsored a series of investments including Compaq, Cypress, Intuit, Macromedia, Netscape, Lotus, Millennium Pharmaceuticals, S3, Sun Microsystems, Amazon.com, and Symantec. John was the founding CEO of Silicon Compilers and currently serves on the Board of Directors of Google, Intuit, Amazon.com, Homestore.com, and Sun Microsystems. His privately held company board seats include Good Technology, and Segway. He holds patents for computer memory devices he invented as a design engineer at Monsanto. Recent interests include education, the Internet and biotechnology genomics. John was born one of five children and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. He holds a BS and MS in Electrical Engineering from Rice University and an MBA from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration.
Vic Verma joined Savi Technology in 1990. He previously held the positions of vice president of engineering and chief operating officer at Savi, before becoming president and chief executive officer in 1997. As VP of Engineering, Vic helped design and develop Savi's product offerings, and as COO, he helped negotiate the acquisition of Savi by Texas Instruments in 1995. In 1997, the unit was sold to Raytheon. Vic led the management buyout of Savi from Raytheon in May 1999. He earned a B.S. degree from the Florida Institute of Technology, an M.S.E. degree from the University of Michigan, and an Advanced Engineers degree from Stanford University, all in electrical engineering. He also completed all the coursework and passed the qualifying exam for his Ph.D. candidacy in electrical engineering from Stanford University before leaving to join Savi. In addition, he attended the executive management program for CEOs at Harvard Business School, the AEA Executive Institute at Stanford University, and the Financial Management Program at the University of California-Berkeley. Vic has been granted eight patents and has several other patents pending. In 1994, his DF/Tag product was recognized as the "Most Innovative Technology Developed by a Small Business" by the White House Office of Science and Technology. In 1999, he was the recipient of Florida Institute of Technology's Distinguished Achievement Award.
Guy Kawasaki is a founder and Managing Director of Garage Technology Ventures. Prior to this position, he was an Apple Fellow at Apple Computer, Inc. and sits on the board of BitPass Inc. A noted speaker and the founder of various personal computer companies, Guy was one of the individuals responsible for the success of the Macintosh computer. He is also the author of eight books including Rules for Revolutionaries, How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Selling the Dream, and The Macintosh Way. Guy holds a B.A. from Stanford University and a M.B.A. from UCLA, as well as an honorary doctorate from Babson College.
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.
Before co-founding Fluidigm, as Mycometrix, Mr. Worthington held a variety of engineering, operations and marketing positions at Actel Corporation, which designs, develops and markets field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and associated design and development software and programming hardware. Mr. Worthington served in several departments during his tenure at Actel, including product engineering, R&D engineering management, program management, product planning, and strategic marketing. His last position at Actel was Director, Strategic Marketing and Product Planning. Mr. Worthington received his undergraduate degree in Physics and a Masters degree in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.
Ann Winblad is the co-founding Partner of Hummer Winblad Venture Partners. She is a well-known and respected software industry entrepreneur and technology leader. Her background and experience have been chronicled in many national business and trade publications. Ann has over 25 years of experience in the software industry. She began her career as a systems programmer at the Federal Reserve Bank. In 1976 Ann co-founded Open Systems, Inc., a top selling accounting software company, with a $500 investment. She operated Open Systems profitably for six years and then sold it for over $15 million. Prior to co-founding Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Ann served as a strategy consultant for prestigious clients such as IBM, Microsoft, Price Waterhouse, and numerous start-ups. In addition, Ann has co-authored the book Object-Oriented Software and has written articles for numerous publications. Ann received a BA in mathematics and in business administration, as well as an MA in education and international economics from the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota. Ann also has an honorary Doctorate of Laws from the University of St. Thomas. Ann has served as a Director of start-up and public companies and currently serves as a director of Intacct, The Knot, Voltage Security, Krillion and Mulesource. She is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the University of St. Thomas and is an advisor to numerous entrepreneur groups.
Want to get connected? Sign up to receive regular news, polls and updates from The Kauffman Foundation.
