We don’t usually think of venture capitalists as the “creatives” in today’s economy—at best these stolid investors enable creatives by providing them with the financial backing and the management advice to make their ideas happen.
Think again! Foundation Capital partner Steve Vassallo is at the head of a new generation of Silicon Valley VC’s who did not descend from the heights of finance, but rose through the ranks of design.
99U met with Vassallo in his office at Foundation Capital in Menlo Park to learn about about his background, his motivation, and his future vision.Steve, let’s beginning by figuring out who you are. You took a degree in mechanical engineering at Stanford, but now you are working as a venture capitalist. Can you connect the dots?
I have been a maker since before I can remember, whether it was building crazy Lego models or starting my own business (Steve’s Snowblowing Service—I still carry the card in my back pocket). At Stanford I was planning to get a Ph.D. in robotics and mechatronic systems, but I got sidetracked into a course in “Visual Thinking” where I learned about drawing and sketching, prototyping and need-finding, and creative problem-solving in small teams. That was the beginning of my discovering product design as a discipline.
I then spent five years at IDEO designing sunglasses for Nike, a bun toaster for McDonalds (I think I’m the only venture capitalist who has ever taken a course at McDonald’s Hamburger University), and anesthesia delivery devices. My last project at IDEO was Cisco’s VoIP system; I had to go head-to-head with Cisco engineers who made switches and routers that sit in closets and data centers and who didn’t know the first thing about consumer products, like a phone that might touch a person’s face 100 times a day. We had to educate them about the behaviors we saw in the field—at call centers, trading floors, cubicles—behaviors that if you just sat at your desk you could have never imagined.
But I was never crazy about the time-and-materials model of consulting, so I decided to apply to the Stanford Business School. I spent two years learning about “the business thing,” which I knew nothing about.
Eventually, I joined the team at Foundation Capital—first as an entrepreneur-in-residence, then as a partner—and I found it to be the most stimulating job on the planet. I meet maybe 20 new entrepreneurs a week, and I can’t help but be compelled by the mission they are on. They have thrown themselves…
The post Steve Vassallo: From Designer to Venture Investor appeared first on FeedBox.