Investment interests: Enterprise software; Consumer devices and IoT; Industrial automation and robotics

I grew up in a small town near St. Louis working farms, teaching swimming, building electronic devices, running movie theaters, and lighting stages. While at the University of Illinois I fell in love building PLATO, a pioneering online learning and community platform, and continued this work professionally at Control Data while earning a computer science degree from the University of Minnesota. I later co-founded Streetlight Software to deliver maps and directions to General Magic devices, and was among the first employees of WebTV Networks, acquired by Microsoft. I spent the next 20 years in executive leadership and business development roles at Microsoft and Yahoo.

For fun: Cooking for family and friends, reading books, watching documentaries, riding horses, and listening to EDM

Most memorable trip: A vacation with my wife, Lena, to Tokyo, Kyoto, and Hakone

Fun fact: I’ve traveled to more than 30 countries