Global Entrepreneurship Institute

The Global Entrepreneurship Institute was created and continues to grow through a unique collaboration of philanthropic, corporate, and nonprofit community partners. Their contributions have involved funding, technical, advisory, and pro bono services. We are grateful to the organizations listed below for their continued support to educating the next generation of successful entrepreneurs.

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We thank these great organizations for their support!

Adobe Systems Incorporated
We offer business, creative, and mobile software solutions that revolutionize how the world engages with ideas and information. Adobe customers include enterprises, knowledge workers, creatives and designers, OEM partners, and developers worldwide. We help our customers create, deliver, and optimize compelling content and applications, improving the impact of their communications, enhancing their brands and productivity, and ultimately bringing them greater business success. Together, we’re turning ordinary interactions into more valuable digital experiences every day, across media and devices, anywhere, anytime.

AMACOM Books
AMACOM is the book publishing division of the American Management Association. AMACOM’s broad range of offerings spans not only the critical business topics and leadership challenges of today and tomorrow, but also the issues that affect our lives, our work, and our world. AMACOM publishes non-fiction books on business, management, leadership, HR, training, communications, career growth, personal development, marketing, sales, customer service, project management and finance. AMACOM authors are experts in their fields, unrivaled in their knowledge, experience, and reputation. They are world-class educators, successful executives, business owners, trainers, consultants, and journalists—all eager to share their insights and techniques with a broad audience.

Angel Capital Education Foundation (ACEF)
A charitable organization devoted to education, information and research about angel investing for investors, entrepreneurial support organizations, university faculty and students, and policy makers. ACEF was founded by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation in 2005 to support education and research in the field of angel investing. In early 2007, ACEF received IRS approval as a tax-exempt, public charity (501c3), and in March, 2007 it spun out from the Kauffman Foundation as an independent organization. The Kauffman Foundation currently provides grant and other support during ACEF’s early development. ACEF complements a separate organization, Angel Capital Association, a professional membership association of North American Angel groups.

AOL Ventures
AOL Ventures is the venture capital arm of AOL, focused on early stage investing in technology-centric consumer internet companies. They are primarily interested in giving talented founders the unfair advantage they need to scale quickly and grow great companies and tend to focus on opportunities where the fund can bring a blend of their partnership’s value mixed with some flavor of AOL (parent company) involvement. AOL Ventures generally looks to invest in Seed and Series A opportunities and is broadly interested in a variety of themes around AOL’s core content, advertising, local/mapping, paid services and consumer applications.

Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs
Global network of organizations that propel entrepreneurship in emerging markets. The network’s 150+ members provide critical financing and business support services to small and growing businesses that create significant economic, environmental, and social impacts in developing countries.

Band of Angels
The Band of Angels is Silicon Valley’s oldest seed funding organization. We are a formal group of more than 120 former and current high tech executives who are interested in investing their time and money into new, cutting edge, startup companies. We’ve seeded over 200 companies in our history with 40+ profitable M&A exits and 9 Nasdaq IPOs. Band members have founded companies such as Symantec, Logitech, and National Semiconductor and been senior executives at the likes of Sun Microsystems, Hewlett Packard, and Intuit. The Band meets monthly to formally consider three startups selected from among the more than 50 that are screened each month by the Band Deal Selection Process. Entrepreneurs can expect a thorough examination and, occasionally, an investment from some of Silicon Valley’s most accomplished entrepreneurs.

BizWorld
BizWorld’s mission is to enrich every child’s education with experiential learning programs. Our programs add relevancy to academics while improving the understanding of entrepreneurship and money management. BizWorld empowers youth with the knowledge and inspiration they need to succeed in school and beyond.

Bloomberg/BusinessWeek
A global source of essential business insight that inspires leaders to turn ideas into action. Through content, context, and collaboration, BusinessWeek moderates global conversations and moves business professionals forward. Founded in 1929 and published by the McGraw-Hill Companies, BusinessWeek magazine is the market leader, with more than 4.8 million readers each week in 140 countries. Launched in 2004, SmallBiz is BusinessWeek’s magazine for small business. It is distributed on newsstands and through controlled circulation. In response to growing consumer and advertiser demand, SmallBiz increased its frequency in 2007 from four issues a year to six.

Business Wire
A wholly owned subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, is the global market leader in commercial news distribution. Thousands of member companies and organizations depend on Business Wire to transmit their full-text news releases, regulatory filings, photos and other multimedia content to journalists, financial professionals, investor services, regulatory authorities and the general public worldwide. In fact, Business Wire has the most comprehensive news and disclosure network in the world. They originate hundreds of thousands of news announcements each year, with a dramatic impact on capital and commercial markets around the globe and in virtually every industry sector.

Cafe Zoetrope
Named for Francis Coppola’s venerable production company, American Zoetrope, Cafe Zoetrope is located in the majestic Sentinel Building, a San Francisco historic landmark in the heart of North Beach. We are a European-style cafe and offer authentic Italian cuisine and a wide selection of Italian and California wines, including our premium offerings that we carry exclusively at our wineries, cafes and website. One-of-a-kind mementos spanning Francis’ long and celebrated film career decorate the walls while the awnings and heated sidewalks make it comfortable to dine outside even in foggy San Francisco weather.

The Cato Institute
Founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane. It is a non-profit public policy research foundation headquartered in Washington, D.C. The Institute is named for Cato’s Letters, a series of libertarian pamphlets that helped lay the philosophical foundation for the American Revolution. The mission of the Cato Institute is to increase the understanding of public policies based on the principles of limited government, free markets, individual liberty, and peace. The Institute will use the most effective means to originate, advocate, promote, and disseminate applicable policy proposals that create free, open, and civil societies in the United States and throughout the world.

Chapman University, George L. Argyros School of Business and Economics
The Argyros School of Business and Economics at Chapman University develops business leaders who create value for their organizations. Nationally ranked in entrepreneurship by Entrepreneur Magazine and The Princeton Review, the school provides advice in start-up strategies, business and marketing plans, strategies for growing firms, and guidance in securing angel or venture capital funding. Entrepreneurship and ethics as well as written and oral communication skills are integrated throughout the curriculum along with elements of global business. Students are provided opportunities for participation in student organizations, entrepreneurial internships, business plan contests, consulting team projects, and mentorship programs.Chapman’s entrepreneurship program was recently selected by the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) as the first-place winner of the Innovative Pedagogy Award. Additionally, Women 3.0 magazine recently included Chapman University in their listing of Top 50 MBA Programs with an entrepreneurship focus. The Argyros School of Business and Economics is fully accredited by AACSB and offers bachelor’s degrees in business administration, economics and accounting as well as the MBA and EMBA.

CourseSmart
The world’s largest provider of digital course materials. CourseSmart’s comprehensive selection gives students, faculty, partners and institutions a new way to find and access exactly the course material they need in one place. Students and instructors can enjoy the benefits of anytime, anywhere access to important course materials at the click of a mouse from any web browser and on many popular devices including the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch. CourseSmart eTextbooks are available in online and downloadable format. CourseSmart is a venture supported by the leading publishers in North American higher education. Founded in 2007, CourseSmart provides eTextbooks and digital learning tools to millions of student and faculty users.

Dogpatch Labs
Dogpatch Labs was created by Polaris Venture Partners to connect entrepreneurs and help founders conceive and launch startups. They offer desk space, bandwidth, coffee and snacks to aspiring entrepreneurs. Dogpatch Labs has four locations: Cambridge, MA; Palo Alto, CA; New York, NY; and a European location in Dublin. In 1996, Jon Flint, Terry McGuire, and Steve Arnold founded Polaris Venture Partners. Their vision was to identify and invest in exceptional entrepreneurs and operating companies with innovative and disruptive ideas, the skills necessary to become market leaders, and a passion for success. Since its inception, Polaris has believed that diversification across company stage and across industries is the key to outstanding long-term results for the firm’s limited partners.

Draper Fisher Jurvetson
Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ) backs extraordinary entrepreneurs everywhere who set out to change the world. DFJ achieves its mission through its DFJ Global Network of Partner Funds. Together, DFJ and the Network manage over $6 billion and have made more than 600 investments on four continents. With a 24-year history of success across diverse sectors and market conditions, DFJ has led the way investing in emerging technologies, from the Internet and life sciences to clean energy and nanotechnology. DFJ has been proud to back over 500 companies across many sectors including such industry changing successes such as Hotmail (acquired by MSFT), Baidu (BIDU), Skype (acquired by EBAY), United Online (UNTD), Overture (acquired by YHOO), Athenahealth (ATHN), EnerNOC (ENOC), TicketsNow (acquired by TicketMaster), Feedburner (acquired by Google), Interwoven (IWOV), Four11 (acquired by YHOO), Parametric (PMTC), and Digidesign (acquired by AVID). The DFJ Network includes DFJ, DFJ Athena, DFJ Dragon, DFJ Esprit, DFJ FIR, DFJ Frontier, DFJ Gotham, DFJ Growth, DFJ InCube, DFJ Mercury, DFJ Portage, DFJ Tamir Fishman, Draper Triangle, DFJ Vina, DFJ-VTB Aurora, Element Partners, and Epic Ventures.

Draper Richards
Draper Richards L.P. is a venture capital firm investing in early-stage technology companies. We fund entrepreneurs with the energy, vision, experience, and desire to build great companies. Draper Richards is an active investor, dedicated to helping entrepreneurs achieve their maximum potential through contacts, advice, and support. We provide portfolio companies assistance in the areas of strategy, executive team recruiting, and raising capital. Bill Draper is one of the West Coast’s first venture capitalists. He is General Partner of Draper Richards, L.P., a venture capital fund focusing on early-stage technology companies in the U.S. and Draper International, a venture capital fund investing in private companies with operations in the U.S. and India.

Endeavor
Endeavor transforms the economies of emerging markets by identifying and supporting High-Impact Entrepreneurs – those with the biggest ideas and most scalable businesses. Headquartered in New York, Endeavor operates in 11 emerging economies – Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Mexico, South Africa, Turkey and Uruguay – with plans to expand to 20 emerging markets by 2015. In each of these places, Endeavor’s work is supported by a world-class network of business leaders, investors, and entrepreneurs. As of June 2011, Endeavor’s rigorous Search & Selection process has screened more than 23,000 candidates and selected 604 Endeavor Entrepreneurs representing 385 companies from some of the world’s fastest growing economies. In turn, these High-Impact Entrepreneurs have created over 130,000 high-value jobs and generate more than $3.5 billion in annual revenues.

Entrepreneurs Foundation
Entrepreneurs Foundation (EF) was founded in 1998 to make it easy for companies to meaningfully engage in their communities through strategic corporate citizenship and corporate social responsibility programs. Through Entrepreneurs Foundation, over 880+ companies in the United States and Israel have created corporate foundations and community benefit programs. In partnership with Entrepreneurs Foundation, companies leverage their corporate assets to create customized philanthropy and community programs that meet corporate objectives and serve social needs. Entrepreneurs Foundation provides expertise, resources, best practices and a network to companies so that maximum corporate and community benefit is achieved. Additionally, Entrepreneurs Foundation provides a unique model for pre-public companies to invest in their communities by seed funding corporate foundations with pre-IPO stock.

Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year Program
Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur Of The Year® Award is the world’s most prestigious business award for entrepreneurs. The award makes a difference through the way it encourages entrepreneurial activity among those with potential and recognizes the contribution of people who inspire others with their vision, leadership and achievement. As the first and only truly global award of its kind, the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® award celebrates those who are building and leading successful, growing and dynamic businesses, recognizing them through regional, national and global awards programs in more than 135 cities in 50 countries.

Eventbrite
The world’s largest, fastest growing event ticketing company. Eventbrite empowers anyone to host successful live experiences of any type or size by providing an easy way to manage, promote and sell out the event. As the engine for a new generation of live experiences, Eventbrite brings together transactions with social interactions to allow events to live, flourish and gain momentum anywhere online. Eventbrite focuses on empowering live experiences by providing a simple-to-use service that makes it easy for organizers to publish, promote and sell out events, and gives consumers a new way to discover events. Most recently, the company launched social event discovery, an effective and meaningful way to discover events which tightly integrates Eventbrite’s massive database of events with an individual’s personal social graph. This new “event graph” drives social event discovery and helps friends connect around live experiences by using the Facebook Connect APIs to let Eventbrite users share their upcoming events with their real world friends. Eventbrite is privately held and backed by Sequoia Capital.

Foley & Lardner LLP
Dedicated to the forefront of emerging industries, Foley & Lardner LLP has established a significant presence in California and Silicon Valley, leveraging our strong intellectual property (IP), IP litigation, and business law capabilities to make inroads in the strategic life sciences and high-technology markets. Foley is a business law firm of 1,000 lawyers in 22 offices throughout the world. We represent companies from start-up to Fortune 100 stage including Hewlett Packard, Raytheon, Nokia, Stanford Hospital, and Wells Fargo among others. Our Silicon Valley Office represents start-up and emerging companies that are looking to rapidly expand domestically and internationally and the venture capital firms, angels and private equity groups that invest in them.

Garage Technology Ventures
We are a seed-stage and early-stage venture capital fund. We’re looking to invest in entrepreneurial teams with big ideas and a need for seed capital to turn their ideas into great companies. We are willing to invest in unproven teams attacking unproven markets with unproven solutions. We’re not interested in teams that are creating the nth solution to the same old problem or companies who are trying to improve things by only 10 or 20 percent. Garage Technology Ventures’ portfolio companies are among the most cutting-edge technology companies in the world. Our investments cover a broad spectrum of technologies and markets, including software, hardware, telecommunications, application services, materials science, and clean technologies. Most of the companies in our portfolio have grown well beyond the garage, and many have become leaders in their sectors and have created tremendous value for their investors.

GKM Ventures
GKM Ventures invests $2 million to $4 million in later-stage technology companies located in the Western U.S. The primary industry sectors in which the Fund invests are: communications, enterprise software, semiconductors and digital media. GKM Ventures’ significant base of industry executive investors contributes tremendously to the Fund’s due diligence and portfolio enhancement processes. With offices in Los Angeles (HQ) and Palo Alto, GKM Ventures maintains close relationships with other leading venture funds for co-investing opportunities. GKM Ventures is a licensed SBIC.

Global Entrepreneurship Week
Global Entrepreneurship Week is the world’s largest celebration of the innovators and job creators who launch startups that bring ideas to life, drive economic growth and expand human welfare. During one week each November, GEW inspires people everywhere through local, national and global activities designed to help them explore their potential as self-starters and innovators. The initiative kicked off in 2008, launched by former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Carl Schramm, the president and CEO of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. Since then, it has grown to 115 countries with nearly 24,000 partner organizations planning more than 37,000 activities that directly engage more than 7 million people.

Haynes and Boone
With a highly trained team of lawyers focusing on intellectual property, technology transactions, corporate and litigation services, Haynes and Boone’s Silicon Valley office is well equipped to address client needs in California and beyond. Most of our California-based lawyers have earned engineering or technical degrees in addition to law degrees, enhancing their understanding of the intricacies of intellectual property. With more than 70 full-time IP lawyers nationwide, Haynes and Boone’s Orange County and Silicon Valley offices are backed by the full resources of the firm, and multidisciplinary teams are available to address the opportunities California offers for many of our clients, in intellectual property as well as areas including in-bound Asian work, venture-funded corporate matters, and big-ticket litigation such as patent, securities, insurance coverage, and class action labor and employment matters.

The Heritage Foundation
Founded in 1973, a research and educational institution, a think tank, whose mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense. Heritage’s staff pursues this mission by performing timely, accurate research on key policy issues and effectively marketing these findings to our primary audiences: members of Congress, key congressional staff members, policymakers in the executive branch, the nation’s news media, and the academic and policy communities.

IBM Venture Capital Group
IBM Venture Capital Group is dedicated to driving IBM’s commitment to innovation in the venture capital community. We accomplish our mission through proactively building strategic relationships with top-tier VCs, focusing on growth markets and emerging technologies important to IBM, to establish a strong ecosystem that fosters innovation. By working together, learn about the vast capabilities and resources that IBM has available to help portfolio companies: build infrastructure, mitigate risk, speed the path to market and profitability. IBM Venture Capital Group does not perform equity or seed funding. Rather, we engage with established venture capital firms to find new, complementary, and relevant technologies for the industries and customers we serve. All support resources and relationships start with the IBM PartnerWorld program. IBM Venture Capital Group works with established venture capital firms and select venture-backed portfolio companies who are members of IBM PartnerWorld.

Kauffman Foundation
The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation is a private nonpartisan foundation that works to harness the power of entrepreneurship and innovation to grow economies and improve human welfare. Through its research and other initiatives, the Kauffman Foundation aims to open young people’s eyes to the possibility of entrepreneurship, promote entrepreneurship education, raise awareness of entrepreneurship-friendly policies, and find alternative pathways for the commercialization of new knowledge and technologies. It also works to prepare students to be innovators, entrepreneurs and skilled workers in the 21st century economy through initiatives designed to improve learning in math, engineering, science and technology. Founded by late entrepreneur and philanthropist Ewing Marion Kauffman, the Foundation is based in Kansas City, Mo. and has approximately $2 billion in assets.

Kleiner Perkins
In the 1970s, venture capital as we know it today was an untested source of capital to entrepreneurs and an unproven vehicle for returns to institutional investors. Tom Perkins and Eugene Kleiner had a vision of building a venture fund that would invest capital and resources in the best entrepreneurs with bold ideas. Five decades later, it is a model of venture investing that is still flourishing at Kleiner Perkins. Kleiner Perkins and KPCB I. Eight years after launch, Kleiner Perkins set out to raise a third fund and broaden the team to invest in semiconductors, databases and computing. The venture community was beginning to grow teaming together in a syndicated style of investing. As the Kleiner Perkins investment portfolio grew, so did our network of relationships—and we were able to expand the level of support we could provide to entrepreneurs.

Los Angeles Venture Association (LAVA)
Since 1985 the Los Angeles Venture Association has been providing forums where entrepreneurs and executives of middle-market companies actively meet and learn from fellow executives, investors, bankers, financial advisors and other providers of professional services. Their monthly breakfast meetings and our Presidents and Distinguished Speakers Lectures feature exceptional presentations by prominent members of our investment, entrepreneurial, business and academic communities. Sponsored by a number of financial services companies and business publishers. LAVA hosts the annual Investment Capital Conference, focusing on helping entrepreneurs find venture capital.

McGraw-Hill Higher Education
McGraw-Hill Higher Education is a premier provider of teaching and learning solutions for the post-secondary and higher education markets worldwide. It is a unit of McGraw-Hill Education, a leading global provider of instructional, assessment and reference solutions that empower professionals and students of all ages. One of the world’s largest provider of educational materials, information and solutions for the Higher Education and Professional markets, it’s mission is to be the premier worldwide provider of products and services that improve and shape teaching and learning in the digital age. McGraw-Hill Education, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies (NYSE: MHP), has offices in 33 countries and publishes in more than 40 languages.

Milken Institute
The Milken Institute is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) nonpartisan economic research organization. It was founded in 1991 with a mandate to step outside the box and find new ways to create jobs and generate capital for entrepreneurs both locally and globally. Their researchers work in diverse but related economic fields with one common goal: to improve the lives and economic conditions of diverse populations in the U.S. and around the world by helping business and public policy leaders identify and put into practice innovative ideas for creating broad-based prosperity.

National Business Incubation Association (NBIA)
The world’s leading organization advancing business incubation and entrepreneurship. It provides thousands of professionals with the information, education, advocacy and networking resources to bring excellence to the process of assisting early-stage companies worldwide. The association is composed primarily of incubator developers and managers, but technology commercialization specialists, educators and business assistance professionals are also well represented. Its mission is to provide training and a clearinghouse for information on incubator management and development issues and on tools for assisting start-up and fledgling firms.

National Venture Capital Association
The National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), comprised of more than 450 member firms, is the premier trade association that represents the U.S. venture capital industry. NVCA’s mission is to foster greater understanding of the importance of venture capital to the U.S. economy, and support entrepreneurial activity and innovation. The NVCA represents the public policy interests of the venture capital community, strives to maintain high professional standards, provides reliable industry data, sponsors professional development, and facilitates interaction among its members.

Oracle Corporation
Oracle provides the world’s most complete, open, and integrated business software and hardware systems, with more than 370,000 customers—including 100 of the Fortune 100—representing a variety of sizes and industries in more than 145 countries around the globe. Oracle’s product strategy provides flexibility and choice to our customers across their IT infrastructure. Now, with Sun server, storage, operating-system, and virtualization technology, Oracle is the only vendor able to offer a complete technology stack in which every layer is integrated to work together as a single system. In addition, Oracle’s open architecture and multiple operating-system options gives our customers unmatched benefits from industry-leading products, including excellent system availability, scalability, energy efficiency, powerful performance, and low total cost of ownership.

Organization of American States (OAS)
Brings together the nations of the Western Hemisphere to strengthen cooperation on democratic values, defend common interests and debate the major issues facing the region and the world. The OAS is the region’s principal multilateral forum for strengthening democracy, promoting human rights, and confronting shared problems such as poverty, terrorism, illegal drugs and corruption. It plays a leading role in carrying out mandates established by the hemisphere’s leaders through the Summits of the Americas. With four official languages — English, Spanish, Portuguese and French — the OAS reflects the rich diversity of the hemisphere’s peoples and cultures. It is made up of 35 member states: the independent nations of North, Central and South America and the Caribbean. The government of Cuba, a member state, has been suspended from participation since 1962; thus only 34 countries participate actively. Nations from other parts of the world participate as permanent observers, which allows them to closely follow the issues that are critical to the Americas.

Palomar Ventures
Launched in 1999 by veteran venture capitalists to focus on early stage information technology companies that demonstrate the potential for exceptional growth and market leadership. The partners at Palomar have contributed their energy, strategic insight, network of corporate relationships and recruiting skills to assist in building nearly 50 public companies. Palomar Ventures is currently investing Palomar II, a $220 million fund. A typical investment involves $2 million to $5 million in capital, and they prefer to act as a lead or co-lead investor early in the process of value formation. They believe that beginning early with a company is the best way to utilize their experience in building value rapidly by focusing the company on a small number of key milestones.

Plug and Play
Plug and Play is a global innovation platform. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, we have built accelerator programs, corporate innovation services, and an in-house VC to make technological advancement progress faster than ever before. Since inception in 2006, our programs have expanded worldwide to include a presence in over 30 locations globally, giving startups the necessary resources to succeed in Silicon Valley and beyond. With over 30,000 startups and 400 official corporate partners, we have created the ultimate startup ecosystem in many industries. Companies in our community have raised over $9 billion in funding, with successful portfolio exits including Danger, Dropbox, Lending Club and PayPal.

Polaris Venture Partners
A partnership of experienced venture capital investors and technology executives. Founded in 1996, their mission is to identify and invest in seed, first round, and early stage technology and life science businesses with exceptional promise and help them grow into sustainable, market-leading companies. In addition, Polaris is committed to providing growth equity and shareholder liquidity to established companies in the technology, healthcare, manufacturing, media, communications, and business services sectors. As a national venture capital firm with offices in the high-tech centers of Boston and Palo Alto, they are able to invest in businesses throughout the United States and around the world. The firm has over $3 billion under management and current investments in more than 100 companies. Polaris has made investments in successful companies like Akamai, Allaire, Alnylam, Automattic, JibJab, LegalZoom, LogMeIn, PowerSoft, QuantCast, Sirtris, and SolidWorks.

Price Center for Entrepreneurial Studies (UCLA)
The Harold Price Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, a recognized global leader in entrepreneurial education and research, oversees all teaching research, extracurricular, and community activities related to entrepreneurship at the John E. Anderson Graduate School of Management at UCLA. Working closely with its Board of Advisors, the Price Center’s goal is to provide a set of academic and extracurricular experiences that advance both the theory and practice of entrepreneurship.

Salesforce.com Foundation
The Salesforce.com Foundation is based on a simple idea: Donate 1% of salesforce.com’s resources to support organizations that are working to make our world a better place. Our unique model was designed to grow along with salesforce.com. The ultimate goal: to disseminate the financial, technological and intellectual wealth of the organization to those in our communities who need it most. That’s the Power of Us. The Salesforce.com Foundation was officially launched at an event featuring former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, less than a year after the company’s formation. More than ten years later, integrated philanthropy remains one of salesforce.com’s core values. Our success has proven that weaving philanthropy into the fabric of a company right from the start—rather than waiting for a certain level of comfortable success—is an approach that works.

Silicon Valley Bank
The spirit of investing in opportunity inspires Silicon Valley Bank. We have partnered with, banked, and built relationships with the venture capital community for almost 30 years. Our foundation in, and focus on, your world gives us rare insight into, and an unparalleled understanding of the unique needs of venture capital firms. For you, this translates to leveraging our suite of global services and networks to satisfy the full spectrum of your needs. Not only do we have a dedicated team of specialists who create fully customized solutions, but our renowned quality of service and execution are what give you the agility to succeed where others would still be assessing the opportunity. Simply put, as the global leader in banking the top venture capital firms, we not only speak your language, we know your world.

Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP)
The Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP) is the entrepreneurship education and research center located within the School of Engineering at Stanford University. The center is hosted by the department of Management Science and Engineering. The mission of the center is to build a world-class center dedicated to accelerating high-technology entrepreneurship research and education for engineers and scientists worldwide. STVP supports academic research on high-technology entrepreneurship and teaches a wide range of courses to science and engineering students on campus. The outreach efforts include annual conferences, campus-wide collaboration, and dissemination of teaching content through the ECorner website.

Tech Coast Angels
The largest formal angel network in the United States. The network is the number one source of startup funding for entrepreneurs in Southern California. TCA members have invested over $100 million in over 155 companies and have helped attract over $1 billion of additional capital. TCA members invest in companies in a wide range of industries, including the life sciences, biotech, IT, services, retail, Internet, financial, software, media, consumer products and tech startups. TCA members provide entrepreneurs more than just capital. Members provide counsel, mentoring and access to an extensive network of potential investors, customers, strategic partners and management talent. TCA has more than 250 members, including its venture capital affiliates, in five networks in from Santa Barbara to San Diego, including Los Angeles, Orange County, and the Inland Empire.

TEDx
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.

Wahoo’s Restaurant
The Wahoo’s story begins in 1988, when the three Wahoo’s brothers, Wing, Ed and Mingo, combined their love of surf and food to create a restaurant with an eclectic Mexican/Brazilian/Asian menu and a Hawaiian north-shore vibe. Wing, Ed and Mingo were born with the love of restaurants in their blood. Growing up in San Paolo, Brazil, they actually spent their early years above their parents’ Chinese restaurant. After school, you could find the brothers in the restaurant peeling shrimp or washing dishes. In 1975, the family moved to Orange County, California, where their dad opened the famous Shanghai Pine Garden Chinese restaurant on Balboa Island. People such as John Wayne would frequently eat there. The brothers grew up both in the restaurant and on the beaches. Addicted to surfing, they would travel south to Mexico to surf and there got introduced to the fish taco. Years of surfing trips to Mexico created a craving for the specialty of charbroiled fish, salsa and tortillas.

Wells Fargo
Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE: WFC) is a diversified financial services company providing banking, insurance, investments, mortgage and consumer finance through almost 6,000 stores, the internet and other distribution channels across North America and internationally. Wells Fargo is dedicated to helping small businesses succeed. They provide financial products and solutions to more than one million businesses with annual sales up to $20 million. Wells Fargo is America’s #1 small business lender in total dollar volume according to the most recent Community Reinvestment Act data (2006) and the #1 SBA 7a bank lender in total dollar volume. They are a SBA Preferred Lender in 50 states and originated 4,306 loans for over $613 million in 2007.

Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati is the premier legal advisor to technology, life sciences, and other growth enterprises worldwide. We represent companies at every stage of development, from entrepreneurial start-ups to multibillion-dollar global corporations, as well as the venture firms, private equity firms, and investment banks that finance and advise them. The firm’s broad range of services and practice areas are focused on addressing the principal challenges faced by the management, boards of directors, shareholders, and in-house counsel of our clients. Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati has offices in Austin; Beijing; Brussels; Hong Kong; Los Angeles; New York; Palo Alto; San Diego; San Francisco; Seattle; Shanghai; Washington, D.C.; and Wilmington, DE.

Young Americas Business Trust (YABT)
A non-profit corporation recognized by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c) (3) organization. It is affiliated with the General Secretariat of the Organization of American States (OAS), and aims to advance the goals of the OAS and Presidential Summits of the Americas to create employment opportunities and reduce poverty by supporting and promoting youth entrepreneurship. Currently, YABT also has National YABTs and representatives in twenty-five countries in the Americas. Being located at the General Secretariat of the OAS gives YABT a unique platform for private/public sector collaboration. The OAS provides substantial overhead and management support for YABT, which enables YABT to put more of its resources into fulfilling its mission instead of addressing administrative matters.