Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum
October 23, 2008 Program
[Register Now]
The Current Economic Turmoil and the Entrepreneur:
the
Impact on New Venture Financing and Survival
Original Announcement:
Join us for a special edition of the Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum as we will turn our attention to the immediate difficulties of our capital markets and how they impact economic opportunity for today’s emerging entrepreneurs.
The Venture Capital model of financing new ventures is struggling. The IPO markets are shut-down and M&A valuations are off significantly. The availability of credit, always in short supply for emerging companies, is tightening. How long will this last? Where are we headed? What should we do?
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"Will today’s uncertain economic environment cripple the new venture economy? If so – for how long? Who will survive? Who will thrive?" |
Jerry Engel will ask the tough questions and offer his own views. Our distinguished panel includes:
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| Brian Atwood, Co-founder, Versant Ventures |
Garrett Gruener, Co-founder, Alta Partners |
Jim Wilcox, Haas School Professor |
and Mike Gridley, Principal, Industry Ventures |
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Brian Atwood specializes in biotechnology investing at Versant. Brian co-founded Versant Ventures after spending four years at Brentwood Venture Capital where as a general partner he led investments in biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, and bioinformatics. He also has more than 15 years of operating experience in the biotechnology industry, with emphasis on therapeutic products, devices, diagnostics, and research instrumentation. Prior to launching his career in venture capital, Brian was founder, president, and CEO of Glycomed, a publicly traded biotechnology company. Prior to this, he co-founded and served as director of Perkin Elmer/Cetus Instruments, a joint venture for robotics automation and genomics research instruments and products later acquired by Perkin Elmer.
Brian currently serves as a Board member at the private companies ForteBio Inc., FivePrime Therapeutics, Inc., Veracyte, Inc., Trius Therapeutics, Inc., Synosia Therapeutics, OpGen, Inc., PhaseRx, Inc., and Immune Design Corp., as well as public companies, Cadence Pharmaceuticals (CADX), and Helicos Biosciences (HLCS). Brian received a Bachelor's degree in Biological Sciences from the University of California, Irvine; a Master's degree from the University of California, Davis, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Mike Gridley is Principal at Industry Ventures, where he concentrates on originating, valuing and managing investment opportunities in secondary venture portfolios.
Prior to Industry Ventures, Mike served for three years as an Associate at BV Capital (formerly Bertelsmann Ventures), a $275 million international venture fund. At BV, he sourced, structured, and managed direct venture investments and developed key co-investment relationships with other venture capital firms and strategic corporate investors in Silicon Valley. Mike was an active participant in two Industry Ventures co-investments: nCircle Network Security and Cranite Systems. Earlier in his career, Mike worked in Business Development at Personify (acquired by Accrue Software). Mike holds a MS from the London School of Economics and a BA from University of California at Berkeley, where he was a Regents and Alumni Scholar.
Garrett Gruener is a co-founder of Alta, and was also a Partner at Burr, Egan, Deleage & Co., which he joined in 1992. He has more than two decades of experience in the fields of software development, systems engineering and corporate development. In 1982, he founded Virtual Microsystems, a successful communications software company that was later merged with a larger corporation. Garrett also founded Ask Jeeves, now Ask.Com, a leading Internet search engine which is now part of IAC. Garrett specializes in information technology and is on the board of directors of Aegis Lightwave, Ellie Mae, Nanomix, nCircle Network Security and Tacit Knowledge Systems.
He earned a Masters Degree from the University of California, Berkeley and a Bachelor of Science from the University of California, San Diego, both in Political Science with a focus on technology policy.
Jim Wilcox is the Kruttschnitt Family Professor of Financial Institutions at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. Among the topics of his research have been credit union conversions, mutual thrift conversions, economies of scale and costs in credit unions, bank mergers, deposit insurance reform, house prices and the housing market, the unbanked, the banking safety net, competition in financial regulation, small business lending, and the effects of GSEs on the economy.
Since the recent financial turmoil falls within his area of expertise, he has been quoted extensively in the media about the crisis. A quote from Professor Wilcox on the crisis on 10/21/08: "Efforts by the Treasury and the Fed to get credit flowing to businesses and households may start to bear fruit soon, at relatively little cost to taxpayers. The next two phases of the government’s efforts to revive the economy may well involve a tax credits for business capital spending and for household purchases of homes, funds to help state and local governments continue infrastructure projects and maintain payrolls, and support for programs that can remove financing obstacles for both small businesses and households."
All programs begin with a networking hour from 6:30 to 7:30 with complimentary drinks and hors d'oeuvres in the Bank of America Forum at the Haas School of Business. A presentation by a variety of speakers of interest to the Bay Area entrepreneurial community follows in the Andersen Auditorium at 7:30 PM.
Registration is required. If you are currently a UC Berkeley faculty, staff, or student, a Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory employee, or associated with the UC Office of the President, call 642-4255 or e-mail lester@haas.berkeley.edu for special rates. If you are unfamiliar with the UC Berkeley campus, check out the campus map to locate the Haas School on the east (uphill) side of campus.
