History
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and venture capital |
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Early history |
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The growth of the venture capital industry was fueled by the emergence of independent investment firms on Sand Hill Road. Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, founded in 1972, was among these pioneers. At that point, the founders of most venture capital firms came from financial backgrounds, however Kleiner Perkins's founders distinguished themselves through their technology industry experience; Kleiner was a founder of Fairchild Semiconductor and Perkins was one of the leaders of Hewlett-Packard's early computer hardware division. Located, in Menlo Park, California, Kleiner Perkins would have access to the burgeoning technology industries in the area. By the early 1970s, there were many semiconductor companies based in the Santa Clara Valley 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, Kleiner Perkins was still active in this period. Kleiner invested in Tandem Computers, an early manufacturer of computer systems, founded in 1975 by Jimmy Treybig.
It was not until 1978 that venture capital experienced its first major fundraising year, as the industry raised approximately $750 million.
Read more about this topic: Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The best history is but like the art of Rembrandt; it casts a vivid light on certain selected causes, on those which were best and greatest; it leaves all the rest in shadow and unseen.”
—Walter Bagehot (1826–1877)
“Three million of such stones would be needed before the work was done. Three million stones of an average weight of 5,000 pounds, every stone cut precisely to fit into its destined place in the great pyramid. From the quarries they pulled the stones across the desert to the banks of the Nile. Never in the history of the world had so great a task been performed. Their faith gave them strength, and their joy gave them song.”
—William Faulkner (1897–1962)
“When the landscape buckles and jerks around, when a dust column of debris rises from the collapse of a block of buildings on bodies that could have been your own, when the staves of history fall awry and the barrel of time bursts apart, some turn to prayer, some to poetry: words in the memory, a stained book carried close to the body, the notebook scribbled by hand—a center of gravity.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)