James G. Treybig is the founder of

Tandem Computers Tandem Computers, Inc. was the dominant manufacturer of fault-tolerant computer systems for Automated teller machine, ATM networks, banks, stock exchanges, telephone switching centers, and other similar commercial transaction processing applicati ...

, which designed and manufactured the first

fault tolerant Fault tolerance is the property that enables a system to continue operating properly in the event of the failure of one or more faults within some of its components. If its operating quality decreases at all, the decrease is proportional to the ...

computers, in 1974. These pioneering computers were marketed to

transaction processing Transaction processing is information processing in computer science that is divided into individual, indivisible operations called ''transactions''. Each transaction must succeed or fail as a complete unit; it can never be only partially comple ...

customers, who used them for ATMs, banks, stock exchanges, and military applications.

Early life and education

Treybig grew up in

Bellaire, Texas Bellaire is a city in southwest Harris County, Texas, United States, within the metropolitan area.. Retrieved on January 24, 2010. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city population was 17,202. It is surrounded by the cities of Houston and West Un ...

, and attended Bellaire High School from 1956 to 1959. He then went to

Rice University William Marsh Rice University (Rice University) is a Private university, private research university in Houston, Houston, Texas. It is on a 300-acre campus near the Houston Museum District and adjacent to the Texas Medical Center. Rice is ranke ...

, where he received a

B.A. Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

degree in 1963 and a

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ...

electrical engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

in 1964; following that he went to

Stanford Graduate School of Business The Stanford Graduate School of Business (also known as Stanford GSB) is the graduate business school of Stanford University, a private research university in Stanford, California. For several years it has been the most selective business schoo ...

, where he earned an MBA in 1968.

Career

Treybig's first job after graduating from Rice was as a salesman for

Texas Instruments Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) is an American technology company headquartered in Dallas, Texas, that designs and manufactures semiconductors and various integrated circuits, which it sells to electronics designers and manufacturers globall ...

. After receiving his MBA, he went to work for

Hewlett-Packard The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard ( ) or HP, was an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Palo Alto, California. HP developed and provided a wide variety of hardware components ...

(HP) in 1968, serving as marketing section manager on the

HP 3000 The HP 3000 series is a family of 16-bit and 32-bit minicomputers from Hewlett-Packard. It was designed to be the first minicomputer with full support for time-sharing in the hardware and the operating system, features that had mostly been limite ...

project, the first ever commercial minicomputer with a full featured operating system with

time-sharing In computing, time-sharing is the sharing of a computing resource among many users at the same time by means of multiprogramming and multi-tasking.DEC Timesharing (1965), by Peter Clark, The DEC Professional, Volume 1, Number 1 Its emergence a ...

, released in 1973. In 1973, he joined

Kleiner Perkins Kleiner Perkins, formerly Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), is an American venture capital firm which specializes in investing in incubation, early stage and growth companies. Since its founding in 1972, the firm has backed entrepreneurs ...

venture capital company. In 1974, he founded

, funded in part by Kleiner Perkins. Treybig served as CEO of Tandem Computers from 1974 to 1996. The business plan included detailed ideas for building a corporate culture reflecting Treybig's values, such as paid six week sabbaticals each 4 years for all employees, an annual gift of 100 shares of Tandem stock to all employees, a weekly all-employee party, and a world-wide closed circuit monthly telecast to keep employees informed. Under his leadership, Tandem delivered its first product in 1976, first issued public stock in 1977, and in 1980 was ranked by ''Inc.'' magazine as the fastest-growing public company in America. When Treybig left the company in 1996, Tandem was a $2.3 billion company employing approximately 8,000 people worldwide. (Tandem was acquired by

Compaq Compaq Computer Corporation (sometimes abbreviated to CQ prior to a 2007 rebranding) was an American information technology company founded in 1982 that developed, sold, and supported computers and related products and services. Compaq produced ...

in 1997, Compaq was merged with HP in 2002.)

Post Tandem

Treybig was then briefly associated with

Austin Ventures Austin Ventures (AV) is a private equity firm focused on venture capital and growth equity investments in business services and supply chain, financial services, new media, Internet, and information services companies nationally with a focus on T ...

; and in August 2002, he became a venture partner at

New Enterprise Associates New Enterprise Associates (NEA) is an American-based venture capital firm. NEA focuses investment stages ranging from seed stage through growth stage across an array of industry sectors. With ~$25 billion in committed capital, NEA is one of the w ...

, an association that continues to the present. Treybig was featured in the documentary film ''

Something Ventured "Something Ventured" is a 2011 documentary film investigating the emergence of American venture capitalism in the mid-20th century. ''Something Venture''d follows the stories of the venture capitalists who worked with entrepreneurs to start and b ...

'', which premiered in 2011.

Personal life

Treybig lives in

Austin, Texas Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the county seat, seat and largest city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and Williamson County, Texas, Williamson co ...

, and is active on

amateur radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emergency communic ...

(

6-meter band The 6-meter band is the lowest portion of the very high frequency (VHF) radio spectrum internationally allocated to amateur radio use. The term refers to the average signal wavelength of 6 meters. Although located in the lower portion of t ...

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigne ...

W6JKV), a hobby he has enjoyed since high school.Jim Treybig's W6JKV website
/ref> He continues to play

racquetball Racquetball is a racquet sport and a team sport played with a hollow rubber ball on an indoor or outdoor court. Joseph Sobek invented the modern sport of racquetball in 1950, adding a stringed racquet to paddleball in order to increase velo ...

, as he has since college.

References

External links

Jimmy Treybig: NEA Bio
- New Enterprise Associates venture capital firm
More about Jimmy Treybig
- Jimmy Treybig website Amateur radio people Rice University alumni Living people American company founders 1940 births {{compu-bio-stub