My Life as an EIC

From 2003 to 2008 I helped build MySQL into $100 million business, at that time sold it to Sun Microsystems for $1 billion cash. By the time Oracle acquired Sun in early 2010, I was ready to take a few months off. I travelled across the US, Europe and Mongolia, learned to play blues guitar and cycled a couple thousand miles. By September, I wanted to re-engage, nevertheless I wasn't sure what kind of possibility would be the best fit.

Scale made two investments during I was there: Docusign, which illustrated the consumerization trend, and Scale Computing, which provides commodity storage for small and medium businesses. Both companies had strong teams and a clear path to the future, however even more important, they had rapid growth in the market. No amount of PowerPoint slides can hide the fact that a company either has traction or it doesn't.

For me, working as an EIR gave me a greater appreciation for the investment side of the business and how companies are valued. It's amazing to see how many companies a venture firm engages with and evaluates in order to make investments. I have no doubt this experience will be helpful to me in the rest of my career.