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Sequoia's only homeless partner
Doug Leone had gone through a divorce at thirty and handed his ex-wife everything. Sequoia, the venture capital firm, bought new partners a car in those days, so he had a car and a car allowance of four hundred dollars a month, and nothing else.
He showered at the office at 3000 Sand Hill Road and parked a little farther from the building than usual. After a week or so, one of the other associates took him in for about three weeks, and then he had enough money to rent an apartment.
He chuckled through that week: a partner at Sequoia, showering at the office and sleeping in a car. He was healthy, and his future earnings were going to be terrific, so it was only an inconvenience. He was the only homeless partner Sequoia has ever had.
Why do venture partners earn mostly through carry?
Venture partners typically take a modest salary and earn most of their pay from carried interest, a share of a fund's profits. By convention that share is about twenty percent of the gains, and it is paid only after investors have gotten their original money back. Because funds usually run for about ten years, the largest payouts arrive long after the work is done.
How did Sand Hill Road become venture's address?
Sand Hill Road runs through Menlo Park, right beside Stanford University. Kleiner Perkins, which opened in 1972, was among the first venture firms on the road, and Sequoia, founded the same year, later made its home there too. Over the following decades more firms clustered along it, and the road's name became shorthand for venture capital.
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