Kleiner Perkins, formerly Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), is an American
venture capital firm
Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which hav ...
which specializes in investing in incubation, early stage and growth companies. Since its founding in 1972, the firm has backed entrepreneurs
in over 900 ventures,
["Assets"](_blank)
Kleiner Perkins, 2019 including
America Online,
[ ]Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational technology company focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It has been referred to as "one of the most influential econo ...
,[ ]Tandem Computers
Tandem Computers, Inc. was the dominant manufacturer of fault-tolerant computer systems for ATM networks, banks, stock exchanges, telephone switching centers, and other similar commercial transaction processing applications requiring maximum up ...
, 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 ...
,[ ]Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...
,[ ]JD.com
JD.com, Inc., also known as Jingdong (), internationally known as Joybuy and formerly called 360buy,[ ...](_blank)
, Square
In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90- degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length a ...
,[ Genentech,][ ]Google
Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...
, Netscape, Sun Microsystems, Nest
A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of organic materi ...
, Palo Alto Networks
Palo Alto Networks, Inc. is an American multinational cybersecurity company with headquarters in Santa Clara, California. The core products is a platform that includes advanced firewalls and cloud-based offerings that extend those firewalls to ...
, Synack, Snap
Snap or SNAP may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Snap'', the original release title for the 2013 film ''Enter the Dangerous Mind''
*''Snap'' (TV series), a CITV programme
* ''The Stanly News and Press'', a newspaper in Albemarle, North Carol ...
, AppDynamics
AppDynamics is a full-stack application performance management (APM) and IT operations analytics (ITOA) company based in San Francisco. The company focuses on managing the performance and availability of applications across cloud computing envi ...
, and Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
.[ By 2019 it had raised around $9 billion in 19 venture capital funds]["Future Raises $8.5M in Series A Funding Led by Kleiner Perkins to Digitize the Personal Training Experience"](_blank)
Kleiner Perkins, 5/23/2019 and four growth funds.[
Kleiner Perkins is headquartered in Menlo Park in ]Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Coun ...
,[ with offices in ]San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
[Kleiner Perkins Offices at KPCB.com](_blank)
and Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...
, China.
The ''New York Times'' described Kleiner Perkins as "perhaps Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Coun ...
's most famous venture firm".[ '']The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' called it one of the "largest and most established" venture capital firms and ''Dealbook'' named it "one of Silicon Valley's top venture capital providers."
History
The firm was formed in 1972 as Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers (KPCB)[KPCB Information Technology](_blank)
in Menlo Park, California
Menlo Park is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County within the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, Palo Alto, and Stanford to the south ...
, with a focus on seed, early-stage, and growth companies.[ The firm is named after its four founding partners: ]Eugene Kleiner
Eugene Kleiner (12 May 1923 – 20 November 2003) was an Austrian-American engineer and venture capitalist. He is considered a pioneer of Silicon Valley. He was one of the original founders of Kleiner Perkins, the Silicon Valley venture capital fi ...
, Tom Perkins, Frank J. Caufield, and Brook Byers.[ Kleiner was a founder of Fairchild Semiconductor, and Perkins was an early Hewlett-Packard executive.][ Byers joined in 1977.][
Located in ]Menlo Park, California
Menlo Park is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County within the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, Palo Alto, and Stanford to the south ...
, Kleiner Perkins had access to the growing technology industries in the area. By the early 1970s, there were many semiconductor
A semiconductor is a material which has an electrical conductivity value falling between that of a conductor, such as copper, and an insulator, such as glass. Its resistivity falls as its temperature rises; metals behave in the opposite way. ...
companies based in the Santa Clara Valley
The Santa Clara Valley is a geologic trough in Northern California that extends 90 miles (145 km) south–southeast from San Francisco to Hollister. The longitudinal valley is bordered on the west by the Santa Cruz Mountains and on the east ...
as well as early computer firms using their devices and programming and service companies. Venture capital firms suffered a temporary downturn in 1974, when the stock market crashed and investors were naturally wary of this new kind of investment fund. Nevertheless, the firm was still active in this period. By 1996, Kleiner Perkins had funded around 260 companies a total of $880 million.[ Beyond the original founders, notable members of the firm have included individuals such as] John Doerr
L. John Doerr (born June 29, 1951) is an American investor and venture capitalist at Kleiner Perkins in Menlo Park, California. In February 2009, Doerr was appointed a member of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board to provide the Pre ...
,[
] Vinod Khosla
Vinod Khosla (born 28 January 1955) is an Indian-American businessman and venture capitalist. He is a co-founder of Sun Microsystems and the founder of Khosla Ventures. Khosla made his wealth from early venture capital investments in areas suc ...
, and Bill Joy
William Nelson Joy (born November 8, 1954) is an American computer engineer and venture capitalist. He co-founded Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla, and Andy Bechtolsheim, and served as Chief Scientist and CTO at ...
.
Colin Powell joined as a "strategic" partner in 2005, while Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. Gore was the Democratic no ...
joined as a partner[ in 2007] as part of a collaboration between Kleiner Perkins and Generation Investment Management. Mary Meeker
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, death_place =
, death_cause =
, nationality = American
, citizenship =
, education ...
joined the firm in 2010,[ and that year Kleiner Perkins expanded its practice to invest in growth stage companies.] Meeker departed in 2019 to found Bond Capital.["Mary Meeker Makes First Investment Out of Bond Capital"](_blank)
'' Fortune'', Polina Marinova, published 5/21/2019 Mamoon Hamid from Social Capital and Ilya Fushman from Index Partners joined in 2017 and 2018 respectively, both as investing partners.
The ''New York Times'' has described Kleiner Perkins as "perhaps Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Coun ...
's the most famous venture firm".[ The firm was described by '']Dealbook
Andrew Ross Sorkin (born February 19, 1977) is an American journalist and author. He is a financial columnist for ''The New York Times'' and a co-anchor of CNBC's ''Squawk Box.'' He is also the founder and editor of DealBook, a financial news s ...
'' in 2009 as "one of Silicon Valley's top venture capital providers",[ and '']The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' in 2010 called it one of the "largest and most established" venture capital firms. By 2019 it had raised around $9 billion in 19 venture capital funds and four growth funds.[
In May 2012, ]Ellen Pao
Ellen Kangourou Pao (born 1970) is an American investor and former CEO of social media company Reddit.
Pao first became known in 2012 for filing a failed gender discrimination suit against her employer, venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins, a ...
, an employee, sued the firm for gender discrimination
Sexism is prejudice or discrimination based on one's sex or gender. Sexism can affect anyone, but it primarily affects women and girls.There is a clear and broad consensus among academic scholars in multiple fields that sexism refers primaril ...
in '' Pao v. Kleiner Perkins'', which the firm has vigorously denied. On 27 March 2015, after a month-long trial, the jury found against Pao on all claims. In June 2015, Pao filed an appeal. In September 2015, Pao announced she would no longer appeal the jury verdict.
In September 2018, Kleiner Perkins announced it was spinning out its digital growth team into a new independent firm. The firm announced its 19th fund on 31 January 2019 after raising $600 million. The fund is focused on early stage investments["The Funded: Kleiner Perkins, TCV raise big new funds"](_blank)
''Silicon Valley Business Journal
American City Business Journals, Inc. (ACBJ) is an American newspaper publisher based in Charlotte, North Carolina. ACBJ publishes The Business Journals, which contains local business news for 44 markets in the United States, Hemmings Motor New ...
'', Cromwell Schubarth, 2/1/2019 in the "consumer, enterprise, hard tech and fintech" sectors.["Why VC Firm Kleiner Perkins Wants to ‘Return to Its Roots’ With a New $600M Fund"](_blank)
'' Fortune'', Polina Marinova, 2/1/2019 The firm raised US$600 million for its 18th fund, KP XVIII, in January 2019.
Investments
In March 2008 Kleiner Perkins announced the iFund
The iFund is a US$200 million capital fund. Developers may enter into equity deals for the creation of applications, services, and components for Apple Inc.'s iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad platform. It is being offered and managed by venture capit ...
, a $100 million venture capital investment initiative that funds concepts related to the iPhone, and doubled that investment a year later.[KPCB doubles iFund investment to $200MM](_blank)
It was reported in April 2008 that Kleiner Perkins was raising funds for a $500 million growth-stage clean-technology fund. In October 2010, the firm launched a $250 million fund called sFund to focus on social startups, with co-investors such as Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...
, Zynga
Zynga Inc. () is an American developer running social video game services. It was founded in April 2007, with headquarters in San Mateo, California. The company primarily focuses on mobile and social networking platforms. Zynga states its missio ...
and Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational technology company focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It has been referred to as "one of the most influential econo ...
. In early 2016, the firm raised $1.4 billion in KP XVII and DGF III.
The firm has been an early investor in more than 900 technology and life sciences firms since its founding,
including Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational technology company focusing on e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It has been referred to as "one of the most influential econo ...
,[ America Online,] Beyond Meat
Beyond Meat, Inc. is a Los Angeles–based producer of plant-based meat substitutes founded in 2009 by Ethan Brown. The company's initial products were launched in the United States in 2012. History Founding
Ethan Brown founded the company in ...
, Citrix
Citrix Systems, Inc. is an American multinational cloud computing and virtualization technology company that provides server, application and desktop virtualization, networking, software as a service (SaaS), and cloud computing technologi ...
, 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 ...
, Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...
,[ Genentech,][ ]Google
Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...
,[ ]Intuit
Intuit Inc. is an American business software company that specializes in financial software. The company is headquartered in Mountain View, California, and the CEO is Sasan Goodarzi. Intuit's products include the tax preparation application ...
,[ ]Lotus Development
Lotus Software (called Lotus Development Corporation before its acquisition by IBM) was an American software company based in Massachusetts; it was "offloaded" to India's HCL Technologies in 2018.
Lotus is most commonly known for the Lotus 1- ...
,[ Netscape,][ Shyp, ]Nest
A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of organic materi ...
,["Alumni"](_blank)
Kleiner Perkins, 2019 Sun Microsystems,[ and ]Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
. Some current investments include DJI
SZ DJI Technology Co., Ltd. or Shenzhen DJI Sciences and Technologies Ltd. ( zh, c=深圳大疆创新科技有限公司, p=Shēnzhèn Dà Jiāng Chuàngxīn Kējì Yǒuxiàn Gōngsī) in full, more popularly known as its trade name DJI, which s ...
, Handshake, Coursera
Coursera Inc. () is a U.S.-based massive open online course provider founded in 2012 by Stanford University computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller. Coursera works with universities and other organizations to offer online courses ...
,[ Shape Security,] Farmers Business Network, Interos, IronNet Cybersecurity, Desktop Metal
Desktop Metal is a public American technology company that designs and markets 3D printing systems. Headquartered in Burlington, Massachusetts, the company has raised $438 million in venture funding since its founding from investors such as G ...
, Gusto, Plaid, Rippling, Robinhood, Slack, UiPath
UiPath is a global software company that makes robotic process automation (RPA) software. It was founded in Bucharest, Romania, by Daniel Dines and Marius Tîrcă. Its headquarters are in New York City. The company's software monitors user acti ...
, Netlify
Netlify is a remote-first cloud computing company that offers a development platform that includes build, deploy, and serverless backend services for web applications and dynamic websites. The platform is built on open web standards, making ...
, Loom, Viz.ai, and Looker.["Partnerships (Consumer"](_blank)
Kleiner Perkins, 2019 Very recent investments include Modern Health,["Kleiner Perkins Backs Jared Leto Mental Health Startup"](_blank)
''Business Insider'', 5/2019 Pillar,
CNBC
CNBC (formerly Consumer News and Business Channel) is an American basic cable business news channel. It provides business news programming on weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., Eastern Time, while broadcasting talk sho ...
, Korie Konish, 5/30/2019 Future["Future launches $150/mo exercise app where real coaches nag you"](_blank)
''TechCrunch
TechCrunch is an American online newspaper focusing on high tech and startup companies. It was founded in June 2005 by Archimedes Ventures, led by partners Michael Arrington and Keith Teare.
In 2010, AOL acquired the company for approximately $ ...
'', Josh Constine, published 6/2019 and STORD.["Stord raises $12.3 million to digitize warehousing and distribution"](_blank)
''VentureBeat
''VentureBeat'' is an American technology website headquartered in San Francisco, California. It publishes news, analysis, long-form features, interviews, and videos.
History
The ''VentureBeat'' company was founded in 2006 by Matt Marshall, ...
'', published 4/17/2019
Kleiner Perkins paid $5 million in 1994 for around 25% of Netscape and profited from Netscape's IPO
An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investment ...
. Its investment of $8 million in Cerent was worth around $2 billion when the optical equipment maker was sold to Cisco Systems
Cisco Systems, Inc., commonly known as Cisco, is an American-based multinational digital communications technology conglomerate corporation headquartered in San Jose, California. Cisco develops, manufactures, and sells networking hardware, ...
[ for $6.9 billion in August 1999. In 1999, Kleiner Perkins][ paid $12 million for a stake in ]Google
Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...
.["How John Doerr, the old prospector, finally struck Google"](_blank)
'' CNET'', published 5/3/2004 As of 2019, the market cap of Google's parent company was estimated at around $831 billion.["Google has lost $70 billion off its market cap after a 'nasty combination' of slowing ad traffic and a drop in sales per click (GOOG)"](_blank)
''Business Insider
''Insider'', previously named ''Business Insider'' (''BI''), is an American financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Insider''s parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German pub ...
'', Theron Mohamed, 4/30/2019 As initial investors in Amazon.com Kleiner Perkins scored returns[ in excess of $1 billion] on an $8 million investment.
Key partners
The firm currently has five partners managing investments:["People"](_blank)
Kleiner Perkins, published 2019
* John Doerr
L. John Doerr (born June 29, 1951) is an American investor and venture capitalist at Kleiner Perkins in Menlo Park, California. In February 2009, Doerr was appointed a member of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board to provide the Pre ...
''(chairman)''
* Brook Byers ''(founder)''
* Ilya Fushman
* Mamoon Hamid
* Wen Hsieh
* Bucky Moore
* Ted Schlein
Key Advisors
* Al Gore
Albert Arnold Gore Jr. (born March 31, 1948) is an American politician, businessman, and environmentalist who served as the 45th vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. Gore was the Democratic no ...
* Colin Powell
* Randy Komisar
* Bing Gordon
William "Bing" Gordon is a video game executive and technology venture capitalist. He served ten years as Chief Creative Officer of video game publisher and developer Electronic Arts (EA) prior to his current partnership with Kleiner Perkins Cauf ...
* Eric Feng
See also
* List of venture capital firms
Below is a list of notable venture capital firms.
Assets under management
Shown below are the largest venture capital firms ranked by Assets Under Management.
Capital raised
Data is for capital raised between January 1, 2017, and June 30, 2022. ...
References
External links
www.kleinerperkins.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers
Companies based in Menlo Park, California
Financial services companies established in 1972
Venture capital firms of the United States
1972 establishments in California
Life sciences industry