Private Equity
Gabriel Venture Partners has promoted Scott Chou to managing director. He originally joined the firm in 2000, and has led such deals as STEP Labs, NextG Networks, Boston-Power and SkyCross.
4 min read · 14 September 2009
Dan Google has stepped down as a principal with Easton Capital, according to VentureWire. He will now oversee VC and private equity investments for the family office of the owners of Caithness Energy LLC. www.eastoncapital.com
1 min read · 10 September 2009
Victor Kats has joined Ascension Health Ventures as an investment manager. He began in June, and previously was VP of corporate business development with Allscripts. www.ascensionhealthventures.org
1 min read · 10 September 2009
Emily Melton has joined Mayfield as a partner. She previously was a director with Draper Fisher Jurvetson, where her portfolio company board seats included MyShape, NearbyNow, ProQuo, Redfin and ShareThis. www.mayfield.com
2 min read · 08 September 2009
Kai-Fu Lee, who last week resigned as president of Google China, has launched Innovation Works, an incubator for Chinese IT startups. It has been funded with $115 million, including from lead investor WI Harper Group. Other backers include Steve Chen (co-founder of YouTube), Terry Gou (chairman of Foxconn), Liu Chuanzhi (chairman of Legend Group) and Yu Minhong (chairman of New Oriental).
5 min read · 07 September 2009
Google announced Thursday night that Kai-Fu Lee, president of its Chinese operations, will leave the company later this month to launch an undisclosed project. Kai-Fu, who joined the Internet search giant in 2005 after several years at Microsoft, played a key role in overseeing Google's growth in China. Interestingly, just last week, the U.K.'s Telegraph ran this story that quoted Kai-Fu about his thoughts on mobile computing. "Yes, we can confirm he is leaving us," a Google spokesperson told Reuters, but declined to give more details. I know what Beijing-based Kai-Fu is up to and why it's of prime interest to the venture capital community. But I'll honor the embargo until Sunday when Kai-Fu has promised to reveal all.
2 min read · 04 September 2009
A bunch of changes over at Battery Ventures: Mark Sherman and Battery have “come to the mutual conclusion” that Sherman will leave the firm once the new investment period of Battery VIII is concluded. That apparently will be at the end of Q1 2010, which means that new blue books might be out before year-end (seems a bit fast to me -- considering that the firm raised $1 billion in 07/08 -- but this is straight from a firm spokeswoman). Sherman had been part of the firm’s push into India, but that now will be scaled back significantly. Battery will no longer build a team in Mumbai, instead focusing on India investments out of Silicon Valley. Guatam Patel, currently Battery’s sole employee in Mumbai, will leave to “seek other opportunities.” That move also is expected to occur at the end of Q1 2010.
2 min read · 03 September 2009
Remember the "extreme job hunters"? That MIT grad who wore a sandwich board and handed out resumes on Park Avenue? The MBA-holding taxi driver who posted his resume in the back of his cab? Their techniques garnered plenty of media coverage, but didn't ultimately land them a job.
2 min read · 01 September 2009
Khosla Ventures has closed two new funds with more than $1 billion in capital commitments. Khosla Ventures III was targeted at $750 million, and will focus on early and mid-stage venture investments in the cleantech and IT spaces. Khosla Ventures also was targeting $250 million for its first seed-stage fund. The two new partners are: Gideon Yu, former CFO for Facebook, and Jim Kim, previously a senior partner with CMEA Capital (peHUB reported Kim's hiring last month).
4 min read · 01 September 2009
Jeffrey Barnes this morning was asked to resign as a general partner with Oxford Bioscience Partners, after the firm learned that he had not complied with policies governing personal securities trading. An OBP spokesman says that he did so with immediate effect, and that it is not expected to have a "material effect" on portfolio performance or firm operations. The spokesman adds that Barnes' transgression involved personally trading in publicly-held OBP portfolio companies without the knowledge of his fellow partners. Barnes originally joined the Boston-based venture capital firm in 1999, after having spent time in the healthcare M&A trenches with both Robbie Stephens and Needham & Co. Before that, he was co-founder and CEO of cardiovascular device company Biosyss Corp. He was one of five general partners on the firm's $150 million fifth fund, which closed
2 min read · 31 August 2009
