Private Equity
I don't have as much insight into Google as I'd like, though what I hear isn't always good, especially when it comes to pay. That Google has historically paid below market wasn't an issue for earlier employees who grew rich after the company went public. Today, however, despite the continued cache that working at Google confers, the low pay can sting. But that's apparently not the only gripe of people who've worked at Google. Over the weekend, TechCrunch obtained what looks like an authentic thread of emails from ex-Googlers elaborating on what they liked, and what they hated, about their experiences at the company. The list is long, and many of the same complaints resurface time and again, including around Google's "ruthlessly inefficient" hiring process, which has become notoriously long. (Google's 20th employee, David DesJardins, told me that back in 1999, he was offered a job three days after calling the company. Today, it routinely takes three to six months to land a job there.)
8 min read · 20 January 2009
Wall Street may be down, but it has managed to cough up a substantial amount of cash for tonight's inaugural festivities. According to DealBook, folks in the finance, real estate, and insurance industries have contributed at least $7.1 million to help fund the numerous parties taking place around Washington D.C. later today. George Soros and four of his family members are among those who’ve given the maximum allowed of $50,000 per person, while Microsoftees Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer have also contributed $50,000 a piece.
1 min read · 20 January 2009
1 min read · 17 January 2009
2 min read · 16 January 2009
2 min read · 16 January 2009
1 min read · 14 January 2009
Kudos to my colleagues at Venture Capital Journal for an illuminating breakfast discussion this morning on how big cleantech projects might get financed in this abysmal economic environment. (Big props especially to Alex Haislip, who organized and moderated the event.) Held at Quadrus, a glass-lined conference center that sits amid a sea of venture capital firms on Sand Hill Road, the breakfast featured three speakers: John Buehler, the managing director of Energy Investors Fund, a project finance company that invests in a range of power-related projects; Ben Kortlang, a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers who focuses on growth-stage green-tech investing; and Rohan Singh, a senior VP at the commercial bank HSH Nordbank. Singh structures debt and equity transactions for renewable energy projects. Herewith, to the best of my note-taking, is some of the conversation that took place:
6 min read · 13 January 2009
1 min read · 13 January 2009
Delicious founder Joshua Schachter left Yahoo in June, feeling as do many entrepreneurs whose companies have been acquired and then stranded by Yahoo that he was “sidelined” by management’s decision-making. At the time, he told TechCrunch that his was an abrupt but certain decision, and that he was looking forward to joining the ranks of the “gloriously unemployed.” Evidently, after seven months or so or total freedom, Schachter has decided he’d rather contribute again to the Web world again -- this time in the employ of Google. Schachter has just accepted a job with the search giant, according to Silicon Alley Insider, which cites a Twitter message about the move that was just sent by First Round Capital Josh Kopelman (an early investor in Delicious and recent subject of a peHUB Q&A). Schachter, as many followers already know, began his career as a Wall Street banking analyst who wrote a popular blog in his spare time.
1 min read · 12 January 2009
1 min read · 12 January 2009
