Dr. Bayless served as chairman of both Landmark Graphics Corporation and CIENA Corporation, two public companies funded by SRF. He is currently serving on the boards of AirWalk, AppTrigger, Extenet, GENBAND, NetSocket, Vidyo, WaveBender, and Xtera Communications.
Jon has taken a lead role in nurturing several SR Funds portfolio companies, including CIENA Corporation, a pioneer in the optical transmission market. The company went public in a 1995 IPO. “We understood the potential of the technology, and, once the product was launched, the market developed quite nicely. That’s the kind of investment we like to make,” he explains.
From Jon’s perspective, hands-on experience is essential to being a good venture capitalist. “We want to get deeply involved,” he contends. “We focus on operating issues - not just financial reports - and what we can do to transform the dream into the reality.”
