THE SILICON VALLEY 100: The most amazing and inspiring people in tech right now
Business Insider
With new startups launching, constant fundraising, and endless chatter, the who's who of Silicon Valley is always changing, and only a lucky few come out on top.
After months of research and debate, Business Insider is proud to present the Silicon Valley 100, our annual list of the people who matter most in Silicon Valley.
To compile the list, we looked at who won big in the past year: star executives, industry-changing acquisitions, top VCs, promising companies shifting industries, and more. This list isn't about long-standing reputations; it's about who's done notable things since spring 2014.
Did we miss anyone? Let us know in the comments below, because we love telling stories about amazing people.
Scroll down to see the 100.
Or see them in A-Z order »
Or in 1-100 order »
The list was compiled by Business Insider's technology editors. Additional reporting by Christi Danner and Tanza Loudenback. Photo research by Melia Robinson.
50. Dheeraj Pandey
Cofounder, CEO, Nutanix
Enterprise virtualization and storage company Nutanix became of the first enterprise unicorns of 2014, with a valuation of $2 billion. The company raised over $141 million in 2014, and $312 million to date from investors including Lightspeed Venture partners, Blumberg Capital, Khosla Ventures, and Goldman Sachs.
Nutanix has become so emblematic of successful enterprise hardware companies that, in Silicon Valley, other startups dream of becoming "the Nutanix of" their markets. Nutanix also has plans to take down incumbent VMware. The two companies are intensely competitive.
49. Chris Wanstrath and PJ Hyett
Chris Wanstrath and PJ Hyett.
Cofounders, Github
CEO Chris Wanstrath is a self-taught coder who dropped out of college to pursue a career in software development. An active profile on GitHub — his software-development tool that allows users to collaborate — has become a popular destination for Valley programmers to work and get hired.
In mid-June, Bloomberg Business reported that GitHub was raising a $200 million round at a valuation of about $2 billion. GitHub has not put out a statement, but rumors suggest that the round is being led by Andreessen Horowitz, the same firm that led GitHub's first funding round back in 2012 when it raised $100 million.
48. Simon Khalaf
President, CEO, Flurry
Last summer, Yahoo purchased mobile-analytics company Flurry for a substantial $200 million. Flurry's technology monitors mobile users' trends and analyzes how people use applications, potentially giving Yahoo an edge in mobile going forward. Yahoo has already addedsupport for the Apple Watch to Flurry's analytics, letting app developers monitor how apps fare on the watch.
Before the acquisition, Flurry raised $73.3 million through eight rounds of funding.
47. Albert Lee and Mike Lee
Cofounders, MyFitnessPal
In a sea of fitness and weight-loss apps, MyFitnessPal manages to stand out. The app, created by brothers Mike and Albert Lee, has been profitable since before it started fundraising and was bought by Under Armour for $475 million in February.
MyFitnessPal aims to help users stick to their diet and exercise plans by not only allowing them to track calories and record workouts but also to follow and encourage friends. The platform is easy to use, making fitness tracking a painless experience, unlike many of the app's competitors, whose interfaces can be cumbersome.
46. Greg Duffy and Aamir Viran
Greg Duffy and Aamir Viran.
Cofounders, Dropcam
Greg Duffy and Aamir Virani joined Google’s Nest team in June 2014 when the tech giant purchased Dropcam, the pair's Wi-Fi-camera company, for $555 million. Dropcam builds webcams for video surveillance, along with a cloud where people can store the videos. Under Nest's umbrella, the companies recently released an updated version of the Dropcam — called Nest Aware — that provides a surveillance camera, digital thermostat, and smoke detector all in one.
Duffy left Nest earlier this year, Tweeting: “I grew up at Dropcam, and I'm going to miss it dearly. But there are exciting things on the horizon.” Virani remains with the company as COO and SVP of product.
45. David Marcus
Vice president of messaging products, Facebook
Since joining the Facebook team last June, vice president of messaging products David Marcus has helped the company improve the app and roll out several features, including a Skype-like video-calling service and the ability to send locations to friends.
Before joining Facebook, Marcus spent three years as VP, then president of PayPal, where he reinvigorated the company by recruiting new talent, adopting new software tools, and developing the company culture. This background in mobile payments makes Marcus an ideal candidate to monetize the messenger app.
44. Megan Smith
US chief technology officer
As the country's CTO, Megan Smith oversees IT policies and initiatives across every sector of the economy. Since taking the post last September — the first woman to ever hold the position — Smith has advised President Obama on decisions surrounding net neutrality, helped improve how technology was used in the fight against Ebola, and built a website dedicated to celebrating women in science in tech.
Smith's no stranger to the consumer side of the tech industry. Before joining the White House team, she served as vice president of Google's secretive Google X division.
43. Susan Wojcicki
CEO, YouTube
When Susan Wojcicki, a longstanding Googler and ad executive, was picked to run YouTube in early 2014, she had her work cut out for her. Her main job was to help YouTube monetize its audience more effectively. Part of that included finding ways for YouTube to promote its home-grown stars like Bethany Mota and the Epic Rap Battles duo and attract more high-quality and deep-pocketed advertisers to the service.
To help build out YouTube's tech offerings, Wojcicki has made a number of internal "hires." She also confirmed onstage at Re/code’s Code/Mobile conference in October that YouTube would explore the launch of an ad-free subscription service.
42. Larry Ellison, Mark Hurd, Safra Catz
Larry Ellison, Mark Hurd, Safra Catz.
Former CEO, now chairman and CTO; co-CEOs, Oracle
Oracle founder Larry Ellison stepped down from his CEO role in September and was succeeded by Hurd and Catz, who took over as co-CEOs. Ellison remains as chairman and CTO of the company; Catz, who was previously co-president and CFO, is now the world's highest-paid female executive; Hurd has been with Oracle since 2010 and was previously the CEO of HP.
Catz and Hurd have a big vision for the direction of the company, and their stepping up led to the stock hitting an all-time high. While Catz has said there would be "no significant changes" in the company, Hurd points out that two CEOs are better than one as the company needs "a lot of leadership." Nonetheless, Ellison still quietly runs the show for the time being.
41. John Thompson
Chairman, Microsoft; CEO, Virtual Instruments
John Thompson had a huge comeback in 2014 when he was named chairman of Microsoft. Thompson led the Microsoft CEO search committee, ultimately hiring Satya Nadella last year. He has been a huge proponent of Nadella, encouraging him to roll out initiatives at Microsoft.
Thompson got started at IBM and later became CEO of Symantec. He grew Symantic from $600 million to $6 billion in revenue when he left in 2009. Thompson is also the CEO of a five-year-old startup called Virtual Instruments, which offers software that helps big companies keep their most important applications from crashing. VI is on track to hit $100 million in revenue.
40. Marissa Mayer
CEO, Yahoo
In September, Alibaba went public. Investors in Yahoo expected Alibaba's public value to send Yahoo’s stock soaring. But after Alibaba's debut, Yahoo's stock crashed.
Months later, Yahoo unveiled a plan to spin off its remaining 15% stake in Alibaba, tax-free, into a public, independent investment company called SpinCo. Yahoo shareholders would receive shares "distributed pro rata," which means they'd own shares in two companies.
39. Reed Hastings
Cofounder, CEO, Netflix
Netflix has been crushing the online-streaming-video category. The company raised a $1.5 billion round of debt financing in February to produce more original content. Wall Street also can’t get enough of it: When news broke in May that Netflix may be entering China, its stock jumped to an all-time high. A month later, its stock broke a new record.
Netflix has even partnered with Marriott Hotels so you can watch movies and TV shows from the Netflix app while on vacation. The company recently launched a new website design.
38. Angela Ahrendts
SVP of retail and online stores, Apple
In spring 2014, Angela Ahrendts left Burberry, where she served as CEO, to go to Apple. There she was named senior vice president of retail and online stores. Ahrendts, who is Apple’s only female executive, made more than $70 million last year; that’s more than anyone else at Apple, including CEO Tim Cook.
Ahrendts also oversaw the rollout of the Apple Watch this spring, and it didn’t quite go smoothly. Instead of having a seamless, easy ordering process by letting people order online and in stores, the shipping date for many models of the Apple Watch was delayed for months. Apple even removed the April 24 availability date from the Apple Watch page on its website, signaling that there were major delays with shipping the device.
37. Patrick and John Collison
Cofounders, Stripe
In September, Apple announced partnerships with a number of retailers and payments companies for its Apple Pay service. Among them was Stripe, a five-year-old mobile-payments startup.
Recently, Stripe has been in talks to raise a funding round that could see the payments company, which has previously raised $190 million in venture capital, reach a valuation of $5 billion.
36. Tony Fadell
Nest Labs CEO, Google
When Google ended its Glass Explorer program in January, many presumed it was the end of the experiment. However, Google Glass — which builds wearable computers mounted on eyeglasses — is just getting started. The project was upgraded to its own department, now led by Nest CEO Tony Fadell.
Fadell will continue to run Nest, the home-automation company he cofounded, which Google purchased for $3.2 billion last year, while figuring out what’s next for Glass. In March, Google CEO Eric Schmidt hinted that the glasses might be on their way to the consumer market.
35. Ellen Pao
CEO, Reddit
Ellen Pao is the interim CEO of Reddit, and she's taking a stand against gender discrimination in the workplace. Previously a partner at venture-capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Pao sued for $16 million in lost wages and future earnings, claiming her gender was a major factor in her not being promoted to general or senior partner, and that it played a significant role in her termination.
Pao lost the case on all counts, but she filed to appeal and is still in debate with Kleiner Perkins over legal costs. Her highly publicized trial brought important issues of gender and diversity in Silicon Valley to the surface, sparking much-needed discussion of the issues.
34. Mark Pincus
Cofounder, CEO, Zynga
Mark Pincus is back on top. Though he stepped down as CEO of gaming company Zynga less than two years ago, the billionaire resumed his CEO role in April. Pincus launched Zynga in 2007 and found success through well-known games “FarmVille” and “Words With Friends.”
However, the company failed to adapt to changes in the gaming landscape and its stock fell tremendously. But with Pincus back at the helm, things are shifting, and it looks like it’s for the better. Zynga beat earnings estimates for Q1.
33. Shannon Liss-Riordan
Employment-rights lawyer
Shannon Liss-Riordan, a Boston-based employment-rights lawyer, is leading the charge against Uber and Lyft. She has represented drivers from both companies who have filed lawsuits, alleging they’ve been misclassified as "independent contractors" when they should be classified as "employees."
Classifying workers as contractors is a common tactic for companies in the 1099 economy — it keeps them from having to deal with things like payroll taxes, job expenses, antidiscrimination protections, and overtime pay. In June, the California Labor Commission ruled that an Uber driver is an employee. Uber plans to appeal.
32. Kayvon Beykpour and Joseph Bernstein
Kayvon Beykpour.
CEO/cofounder, cofounder, Periscope
In March, Twitter launched Periscope, a live-streaming app that it acquired in February before Periscope even launched. Periscope could give Twitter a valuable means to expand into live entertainment and other video and streaming events.
Periscope lets users stream footage from their devices to followers. Viewers can comment and send "hearts" to the streamer. The footage can be replayed later, which sets it apart from rival app Meerkat, where the footage is gone once the stream is over.
31. Meg Whitman
Chairwoman, president, CEO, Hewlett-Packard
HP announced that it would be undergoing massive multiyear layoffs in 2012. Since then, the company has eliminated 48,000 employees. It's on its way to eliminating 55,000 by October. And in November, Whitman will split HP into two companies, and the layoffs will likely continue.
Whitman has also said she’ll be moving more jobs from HP’s Enterprise Services unit offshore after HP splits in two. Last year, Whitman got a $1.5 million raise and a $4.3 million bonus.
30. Justin Kan, Emmett Shear, and Kevin Lin
Emmett Shear, Kevin Lin, and Justin Kan.
Cofounders, Twitch
In August, Amazon bought video-game-streaming site Twitch for $970 million, one of the largest deals in Amazon history.
Twitch is a major player in streaming, accounting for more than 43% of all live video-streaming traffic by volume. The site brings together 100 million gamers each month who watch and discuss video games. For pro gamers, the service creates a lucrative platform for live-streaming their games.
29. Parker Conrad and Laks Srini
Cofounder/CEO, cofounder, Zenefits
Zenefits, a startup aimed at making administrative tasks such as payroll and benefits easier, is shaping up to be one of the fastest-growing cloud companies ever, in terms of both revenue of number of users. In May, it raised $500 million in Series C funding, bringing the company’s valuation up to $4.5 billion. However, it reportedly only generated $20 million in 2014. Only two years old, Zenefits employs 1,000 people and has 10,000 customers.
Though he’s faced several ups and downs in his career, Parker Conrad’s hub-and-spokes model — give Zenefits away and sell services through it — is proving effective as the company continues to grow.
28. Anthony Noto
CFO, Twitter
Anthony Noto, a former Goldman Sachs banker, led Twitter’s IPO. In July 2014, he became Twitter’s CFO. When he arrived at Twitter, his annual salary was $250,000, and he received $64 million in Twitter stock (1.5 million shares), with the option to buy 5,000 more.
Noto has had a couple stumbles as CFO. In November he tweeted what was supposed to be a direct message about acquiring a company. He deleted it. In February, his Twitter account was hacked. Now that CEO Dick Costolo has decided to step down, Noto is on track to be one of the most powerful people at the company, although most insiders don't think he'll be picked as the next CEO.
27. Jimmy Iovine and Eddy Cue
Cofounder, Beats Electronics; SVP of internet software and services, Apple
When Apple acquired Jimmy Iovine’s Beats Electronics in May 2014, Iovine joined Apple at an undisclosed position. Along with Eddy Cue, Iovine helped launch Apple Music, Apple’s music-streaming service. Apple announced the product in June on-stage at its big Worldwide Developers Conference.
Apple Music will allow users to stream from a catalogue of over 30 million songs found on iTunes along with curated playlists and music videos. It competes with streaming services like Spotify, Rdio, and Tidal.
26. Chris Sacca
Founder, Lowercase Capital
Chris Sacca, the founder of Silicon Valley venture-capital firm Lowercase Capital, became a billionaire from his early investment in Uber this year as Uber's valuation shot up to a rumored $50 billion. He owns 4% of the company.
In addition, Sacca was vocal about a number of things. He told Bloomberg TV’s Emily Chang that Carl Icahn's recent investment in Lyft was a "big mistake." Sacca also talked about the crazy amount of VC money in Silicon Valley today. "I think there are naive investors with no discipline, throwing out term sheets at nine figures right now, with no diligence," Sacca said. And he wrote an impassioned 8,000 word critique of Twitter, where he was also an early investor; a couple weeks later, the company announced CEO Dick Costolo was stepping down, replaced by interim CEO Jack Dorsey.
沒有留言:
張貼留言