Vinod Khosla
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Vinod Khosla (born 28 January 1955) is an
Indian-American Indian Americans or Indo-Americans are citizens of the United States with ancestry from India. The United States Census Bureau uses the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Native Americans, who have also historically been referred to ...
businessman and
venture capitalist 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 ...
. He is a co-founder of
Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Sun for short) was an American technology company that sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services and created the Java programming language, the Solaris operating system, ZFS, the ...
and the founder of
Khosla Ventures Khosla Ventures is an American venture capital firm founded by Vinod Khosla, focused on early-stage companies in the Internet, computing, mobile, financial services, agriculture, healthcare and clean technology sectors. Some of its most successfu ...
. Khosla made his wealth from early venture capital investments in areas such as networking, software, and alternative energy technologies. He is considered one of the most successful and influential venture capitalists. In 2014, ''
Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...
'' counted him among the 400 richest people in the United States. In 2021, he was ranked 92nd on the
Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...
400 list.


Biography

Khosla was born on January 28, 1955, in
Pune, India Pune (; ; also known as Poona, ( the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million As of 2021, Pune Metropolitan Region is the largest i ...
. Khosla's father was an officer in the
Indian Army The Indian Army is the land-based branch and the largest component of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Army, and its professional head is the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), who is a four- ...
and was posted at
New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...
, India. His father wanted him to also join the army. He attended Mount St Mary's School for elementary school. Khosla became interested in entrepreneurship after reading about the founding of
Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 seri ...
in ''
Electronic Engineering Times ''EE Times'' (''Electronic Engineering Times'') is an electronics industry magazine published in the United States since 1972. EE Times is currently owned by AspenCore, a division of Arrow Electronics since August 2016. Since its acquisition ...
'' as a teenager, and this inspired him to pursue technology as a career. According to Khosla, he was inspired by Intel co-founder
Andrew Grove Andrew Stephen Grove (born András István Gróf; 2 September 193621 March 2016) was a Hungarian-American businessman and engineer who served as the third CEO of Intel Corporation. He escaped from Communist-controlled Hungary at the age of 20 ...
, a Hungarian immigrant that got funding for Intel in Silicon Valley, when it was a startup. From 1971-76, Khosla attended
IIT Delhi The Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi is a public institute of technology located in New Delhi, India. It is one of the 23 IITs created to be Centres of Excellence for training, research and development in science, engineering and technolo ...
where he earned a bachelor's degree in
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 ...
. He started the first computer club in any IIT to do computer programming and operated the school's computer center while the operations staff were on strike. He also wrote a paper on parallel processing as a teenager before the concept was adopted by the IT industry, and helped to start the first biomedical engineering program in India. In 1975, Khosla attempted to start a soy milk company intended to provide a milk alternative to Indian consumers that do not have refrigerators to preserve cow milk. Khosla received a master's in
biomedical engineering Biomedical engineering (BME) or medical engineering is the application of engineering principles and design concepts to medicine and biology for healthcare purposes (e.g., diagnostic or therapeutic). BME is also traditionally logical sciences ...
from
Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...
on a full scholarship. He applied to Stanford University's MBA program but was rejected for lack of work experience. He had two full time jobs while finishing his master’s for the two years of work experience, but was rejected a second time. Three weeks into starting at Carnegie Mellon for his MBA, Khosla convinced the admissions staff to accept him into
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 ...
and received an MBA in 1980. He is married to
Neeru Khosla Neeru Khosla (born 1955/1956) is the co-founder and chair of the non-profit CK12 Foundation. Early life Having grown up in India and England, Khosla wanted to be a doctor. She had an aptitude for science, but the prerequisite for medicine of anim ...
, his childhood girlfriend. They have four children.


Career


Early businesses and investments

After completing his MBA at Stanford in 1980, Khosla developed a business plan for an electronic design automation company for electrical engineers. He was introduced to employees at Intel and became the first full-time founder and Chief Financial Officer of
Daisy Systems Daisy Systems Corporation, incorporated in 1981 in Mountain View, California, was a computer-aided engineering company, a pioneer in the electronic design automation (EDA) industry. It was a manufacturer of computer hardware and software for E ...
. The company spent 80 percent of its resources on building custom computer hardware that could run its software. As a result, Khosla left the company in order to create a startup that manufactures general purpose computers. In 1981, Khosla co-founded Data Dump with a former Stanford classmate, which ended up failing. In 1982, Khosla co-founded
Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Sun for short) was an American technology company that sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services and created the Java programming language, the Solaris operating system, ZFS, the ...
(SUN is the acronym for the Stanford University Network), along with Stanford classmates
Scott McNealy Scott McNealy (born November 13, 1954) is an American businessman. He is most famous for co-founding the computer technology company Sun Microsystems in 1982 along with Vinod Khosla, Bill Joy, and Andy Bechtolsheim. In 2004, while still at Sun, ...
, Andy Bechtolsheim, who was licensing a computer design to local companies.
UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of Californi ...
computer science graduate student
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 ...
later joined the company as co-founder. Sun Microsystems sold servers to the universities they graduated from and other colleges, desktop computers, and created the Java programming language. Khosla raised $300,000 in seed capital from venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Within five years, Sun made $1 billion in annual sales. Khosla also recruited early executives and developers such as
Eric Schmidt Eric Emerson Schmidt (born April 27, 1955) is an American businessman and software engineer known for being the CEO of Google from 2001 to 2011, executive chairman of Google from 2011 to 2015, executive chairman of Alphabet Inc. from 2015 to 20 ...
and
Carol Bartz Carol Ann Bartz (born August 28, 1948) is an American business executive, former president and CEO of the internet services company Yahoo!, and former chairman, president, and CEO at architectural and engineering design software company Autodesk. ...
. He served as the first chairman and CEO from 1982 to 1984, when he left the company to become a
venture capitalist 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 ...
. In 1986, Khosla joined the venture capital firm
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 ...
as a general partner. At Kleiner Perkins, Khosla managed investments in technologies, such as video games and semiconductors. He helped create Nexgen, sold to AMD for 28 percent of its market cap, which was the first successful Intel microprocessor clone company. He invested in Go Corporation, which developed a stylus-operated computer and was seen as one of the largest Silicon Valley startup failures. In 1994, he suggested that Excite adapt its search engine for the internet and helped finance the special disk drive the company needed to run their search engine. He mentored the founders until the company was sold to @Home for $7 billion, which was it his first venture capital deal of that size. Afterwards, Khosla was an early proponent of
fiber optics An optical fiber, or optical fibre in Commonwealth English, is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. Optical fibers are used most often as a means to ...
and the internet for faster communication and started focusing on telecommunication networking companies. He incubated
Juniper Networks Juniper Networks, Inc. is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. The company develops and markets networking products, including routers, switches, network management software, network security products, ...
and suggested that it develop an "Internet router instead of the plain vanilla router mostly used." Khosla invested $275,000, which became his largest return on investment to date. A $3 million investment in Juniper Networks in the 1990s earned $7 billion for Kleiner Perkins according to ''The Wall Street Journal''. He also incubated
Cerent Corporation Cerent Corporation was an optical equipment maker based in Petaluma, California. It was founded in 1997 as Fiberlane Communications with funding from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Vinod Khosla as the managing VC. The company was founded wit ...
in 1996, which sold to
Cisco 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 $7.8 billion, and Siara, which sold for $3 billion and was its chief executive officer for its first year.


Development of Khosla Ventures

In 2004 to spend more time with his teenage kids and focus on technology startups, Khosla moved to part-time and eventually left Kleiner Perkins. He founded his own venture capital firm,
Khosla Ventures Khosla Ventures is an American venture capital firm founded by Vinod Khosla, focused on early-stage companies in the Internet, computing, mobile, financial services, agriculture, healthcare and clean technology sectors. Some of its most successfu ...
later that year as a way to invest in more experimental technologies with a "social impact." At the time, he had about $1.5 billion from co-founding Sun Microsystems and his work with Kleiner Perkins. The firm is based 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; ...
. Khosla was featured on
Dateline NBC ''Dateline NBC'' is a weekly American television news magazine/reality legal show that is broadcast on NBC. It was previously the network's flagship general interest news magazine, but now focuses mainly on true crime stories with only occasion ...
in May 2006, where he discussed the practicality of
ethanol Ethanol (abbr. EtOH; also called ethyl alcohol, grain alcohol, drinking alcohol, or simply alcohol) is an organic compound. It is an Alcohol (chemistry), alcohol with the chemical formula . Its formula can be also written as or (an ethyl ...
as a
gasoline Gasoline (; ) or petrol (; ) (see ) is a transparent, petroleum-derived flammable liquid that is used primarily as a fuel in most spark-ignited internal combustion engines (also known as petrol engines). It consists mostly of organic co ...
substitute. He has invested heavily in ethanol companies. The firm became known for large, early investments in
alternative energy Renewable energy is energy that is collected from renewable resources that are naturally replenished on a Orders of magnitude (time), human timescale. It includes sources such as Solar power, sunlight, wind power, wind, the movement of Hydropo ...
technology like solar, biofuel, and batteries. He has advocated for breakthroughs in these "clean" energies rather than cutting back on energy consumption. The firm incubated carbon recycling and aviation fuel company LanzaTech and
QuantumScape QuantumScape is an American company that develops solid state lithium metal batteries for electric cars. The company is headquartered in San Jose, California and employs around 400 people. Investors include Bill Gates and Volkswagen. History ...
, a solid state battery company. Khosla has stated both Quantumscape and Lanzatech are unicorns that have taken time and calls them part of "clean tech 1.0." He believes carbon sequestration is an area that needs significant advancements and is the most feasible.
Impossible Foods Impossible Foods Inc. is a company that develops plant-based substitutes for meat products. The company's signature product, the Impossible Burger, was launched in July 2016. In partnership with Burger King, Impossible Whoppers were released ac ...
, which works to make meat a more efficient energy source, and View Glass are also unicorns incubated by Khosla Ventures. ''
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 publ ...
'' reported that it took 10 years to return "more than a billion dollars" to the firm, similar to some of Khosla's other successful investments that also took a decade to pay off. Khosla believes that a dozen dramatic technologies to solve climate change and it is inaccurate to continue
cleantech Clean technology, in short cleantech, is any process, product, or service that reduces negative environmental impacts through significant energy efficiency improvements, the sustainable use of resources, or environmental protection activities. Cle ...
investing as a bust. In September 2009, Khosla Ventures III secured $750 million of investor commitments to invest in traditional early-stage and growth-stage companies. Khosla also raised $250 million for Khosla Seed, which will invest in higher-risk opportunities. He opened up Khosla Ventures to outside investors for the first time that same year. Beginning in 2010, Khosla Ventures began investing in food and was the first investor in companies like
Instacart Instacart is an American company that operates a grocery delivery and pick-up service in the United States and Canada. The company offers its services via a website and mobile app. The service allows customers to order groceries from participatin ...
and
DoorDash DoorDash, Inc. is an American company that operates an online food ordering and food delivery platform. The company is based in San Francisco, California. It went public in December 2020 on NYSE and trades under the symbol DASH. With a 56% mar ...
. Fintech was also an area of focus with early investments. In May 2010, it was announced that former British Prime Minister
Tony Blair Sir Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (born 6 May 1953) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007. He previously served as Leader of th ...
was to join Khosla Ventures to provide strategic advice regarding investments in technologies focused on the environment. During this time, Khosla had hired
Condoleezza Rice Condoleezza Rice ( ; born November 14, 1954) is an American diplomat and political scientist who is the current director of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. A member of the Republican Party, she previously served as the 66th Uni ...
's advisory firm to work with portfolio companies. In 2012, Khosla wrote an article titled "Do We Need Doctors Or Algorithms?" arguing the increasing importance of artificial intelligence in medicine claiming "bionic assistance" will eventually replace most doctors. He started investing in medicine and robotics, such as companies that use artificial intelligence in medical treatments at that time. Khosla Ventures also invested in
HackerRank HackerRank is a technology company that focuses on competitive programming challenges for both consumers and businesses. Developers compete by writing programs according to provided specifications. HackerRank's programming challenges can be solv ...
. In 2018, Khosla stated the plan for the rest of his life was to "reinvent societal infrastructure" through innovation and technology such as 3D-printing houses for the homeless. Khosla has stated "we need 1,000% change if billions of people in China and India are to enjoy a Western, energy-rich lifestyle." He invests in "black swan" technologies that have a high chance of failure but if successful, would have environmental and societal benefits. In 2019, Khosla presented "Amazing: What KV Founders are Doing," which described 100 portfolio companies reinventing areas such as health, infrastructure, robotics, transportation, augmented reality and artificial intelligence. Khosla Ventures manages approximately $15 billion of investor capital as well as investments funded by Khosla himself.


Views


Capitalism

Khosla believes in using capitalism as a solution for social impact due to its ability to scale, which is something he does not believe is possible with non-profit organizations. He has insisted economical, large-scale solutions will succeed when facing global warming as well. Khosla has stated that machine learning technology will replace many jobs and increase income disparities however will also create enough GDP to provide basic income to everyone.


Politics

Khosla has donated to a mix of Democrats and Republicans and supports politicians based on their climate policies. He is a Democrat and has donated to organizations that support left-leaning politics. In 2013, Khosla hosted
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
for a fundraising dinner at his home in Portola Valley. Khosla was a major proponent of the "Yes on 87" campaign to pass California's Proposition 87, The Clean Energy Initiative, which failed to pass in November 2006. Khosla endorsed Democratic candidate
Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States sen ...
in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.


Philanthropy and affiliations

Khosla was honorary chair of the
DonorsChoose DonorsChoose is a United States-based nonprofit organization that allows individuals to donate directly to public school classroom projects. The organization has been given Charity Navigator's highest rating every year since 2005. In January 201 ...
San Francisco Bay Area advisory board. In 2000, Khosla was a recipient of the Golden Plate Award of the
American Academy of Achievement The American Academy of Achievement, colloquially known as the Academy of Achievement, is a non-profit educational organization that recognizes some of the highest achieving individuals in diverse fields and gives them the opportunity to meet o ...
. In 2006, Khosla's wife Neeru co-founded the
CK-12 Foundation The CK-12 Foundation is a California-based non-profit organization which aims to increase access to low-cost K-12 education in the United States and abroad. CK-12 provides free and customizable K-12 open educational resources aligned to state c ...
, which aims to develop open-source textbooks and lower the cost of education in the US and the rest of the world. Khosla and his wife are donors to the
Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., or Wikimedia for short and abbreviated as WMF, is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California and registered as a charitable foundation under local laws. Best kno ...
, in the amount of $600,000. In 2007, Khosla was an award recipient in the Northern California region for the EY Entrepreneur of the Year award. Khosla was a member of the board of trustees of the Blum Center for Developing Economies at the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
. The center is focused on finding solutions to address the crisis of extreme poverty and disease in the developing world. He is an advisor for
HackerRank HackerRank is a technology company that focuses on competitive programming challenges for both consumers and businesses. Developers compete by writing programs according to provided specifications. HackerRank's programming challenges can be solv ...
, a website for competitive coding. He is also one of the founders of TiE, The Indus Entrepreneurs, and has guest-edited a special issue of
The Economic Times ''The Economic Times'' is an Indian English-language business-focused daily newspaper. It is owned by The Times Group. ''The Economic Times'' began publication in 1961. As of 2012, it is the world's second-most widely read English-language bus ...
, a business newspaper in India. He is involved with organizations that provide microfinancing to small businesses in third-world countries and other organizations that promote entrepreneurship. Khosla is on the Board of Trustees at Carnegie Mellon University. Khosla was an early signatory to the Giving Pledge and sits on the Breakthrough Energy Ventures board. In April 2021, Khosla made an offer to fund oxygen imports for hospitals in India amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.


Martins Beach dispute

Since 2010, Khosla has been engaged in a legal dispute regarding public access to Martins Beach, several miles south of Half Moon Bay, California, where he owns adjacent land. Martins Beach was a popular family beach and surf spot before Khosla purchased the property adjacent to the beach and blocked access with a gate, armed guards at the road entrance and painting over the welcome sign. In August 2017, a Californian court of appeals ruled that Khosla must restore public access to Martins Beach. The plaintiffs stated that they expected Khosla to take the case to the US Supreme Court. In October 2018, the Supreme Court announced that it would not hear the appeal of the California appeals court decision. In November 2018, a
San Mateo County San Mateo County ( ), officially the County of San Mateo, is a county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 764,442. Redwood City is the county seat, and the third most populated city following Daly ...
court found that the prior owners of the property had not intended for access to Martins Beach to be public. In January 2020, the
California Coastal Commission The California Coastal Commission (CCC) is a state agency within the California Natural Resources Agency with quasi-judicial control of land and public access along the state's coastline. Its mission as defined in the California Coastal Act is " ...
sued Khosla, alleging he was in violation of the California Coastal Act of 1976.


References


External links

* * (2006-03-29) {{DEFAULTSORT:Khosla, Vinod 1955 births 20th-century American businesspeople 21st-century philanthropists 21st-century American businesspeople American billionaires American technology chief executives American people of Punjabi descent American technology company founders Carnegie Mellon University College of Engineering alumni Carnegie Mellon University trustees American venture capitalists American chairpersons of corporations Businesspeople from Delhi Giving Pledgers Indian company founders Indian emigrants to the United States IIT Delhi alumni Living people Stanford Graduate School of Business alumni Sun Microsystems people Kleiner Perkins people American people of Indian descent American computer businesspeople American chief executives American chief executives of Fortune 500 companies Chief executives in the technology industry