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March 28, 2005
Dr. Ashish Gupta Joins Woodside Fund
as Venture Partner to Concentrate on Global Opportunities
Renowned Entrepreneur, Investor, and Technologist
Joins Silicon Valley Venture Capital Firm
March 28, 2005, Redwood Shores, CA: Woodside Fund,
an early-stage venture capital firm, today announced that Dr. Ashish
Gupta has joined the Redwood Shores-based firm as venture partner
and will focus on developing global investment opportunities for
Woodside Fund. Gupta started his association with Woodside Fund
through the Kauffman Fellows program in July of 2002. His responsibilities
as a venture partner will be to identify and manage investment opportunities
with compelling business models, primarily in the software, Internet
and services sectors. Prior to joining Woodside Fund, he was a founder
and active investor in several information technology companies.
He co-founded Junglee, a data integration software company acquired
by Amazon.com; and Tavant Technologies, a provider of channel collaboration
software. His investments include Daksh, a business process outsourcing
services acquired by IBM; and Bodha, a web-services integration
solution company acquired by Peregrine.
“Ashish has an impressive track record as an entrepreneur,
investor, and technologist,” said Daniel Ahn, a Managing Director
at Woodside Fund. “He is extremely well respected in the entrepreneur
and venture capital community, and brings to Woodside Fund extensive
global operational experience and the proven ability to establish,
grow, lead and exit early-stage ventures. On behalf of all of us
at Woodside, we are honored to have him as part of our team and
have a tremendous respect for his investment acumen and his ability
to build and add value to long-term relationships.”
“Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to work with exceptional
venture capitalists in Silicon Valley and beyond,” said Dr.
Ashish Gupta. “When it became time for me to consider joining
a venture capital firm, I selected Woodside Fund because I was impressed
with the investment team’s entrepreneurial backgrounds and
experience, their proven investment philosophies, and their commitment
to their portfolio companies. I’m excited about the opportunity
to help Woodside Fund’s existing and future portfolio companies
take advantage of global prospects.”
Entrepreneur Background:
Gupta co-founded Junglee Corporation, a data integration software
company and an early pioneer of the web services business model
which was acquired by Amazon.com for $230 million in 1998. He managed
engineering and helped grow the company from 5 to 70 people. He
also co-founded Tavant Technologies, a profitable and leading provider
of channel collaboration software that has grown to 1000 people
with multiple Fortune 500 customers. Gupta also served in senior
technical positions at Oracle Corporation and IBM.
Investor Background:
As an investor, Gupta has invested in early-stage technology firms
such as Daksh, a business process outsourcing services company acquired
by IBM for $160 million in 2004; Bodha, a web-services integration
solutions company acquired by Peregrine; Obongo, a unified login
company acquired by AOL; and Pointcross, a business process interaction
management solution company.
Technologist Background:
As a technologist, Ashish holds seven patents with other experts
in the field including: Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos; Anand Rajaraman,
partner at Cambrian Ventures; and V. Harinarayan, co-founder of
Junglee Corporation. As an author, Gupta has written and presented
numerous papers at international conferences, including a book published
by MIT Press titled MATERIALIZED VIEWS: A Collection of Papers
on the Theory, Implementation and Applications of Materialized Views.
Board Affiliations and Education:
Gupta currently serves on the board of VeriWave, a provider of performance
analysis tools for wireless local area network (WLAN) devices and
networks. His education includes a Ph.D. in computer science from
Stanford University and a B.S. in computer science from the Indian
Institute of Technology at Kanpur, where he was awarded the President's
Gold Medal, the highest national undergraduate honor.
Dr. Ashish Gupta will join the 6 partners at Woodside Fund –
Vincent Occhipinti, Robert Larson, Daniel Ahn, John Occhipinti,
Thomas Shields, and Rick Shriner – who each bring unique technology,
entrepreneurial, operational, and investment experience to the team.
About Woodside Fund
Woodside Fund is a leading venture capital firm that excels in developing
early-stage technology companies. Founded in 1983, Woodside Fund
attributes its long record of success to the high value it places
on building productive partnerships with entrepreneurs, other investors
and service providers. Typically a lead investor, Woodside Fund
invests from $5 million to $10 million in early-stage software,
fabless semiconductor and network infrastructure companies located
primarily on the West Coast. Woodside Fund has more than $330 million
in capital under active management. For more information, go to
www.woodsidefund.com.
Press contact:
Carole Sinclair
925.818.1038
caroles@woodsidefund.com
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