| Website | blognewcomb.com |
| Blog | blognewcomb.com |
| @stevenewcomb |
| Salisbury University, BA | 1993 |
| Accounting |
Steve Newomcb / Virgance
Steve is a 38-year-old seasoned entrepreneur, who brings a wealth of web 2.0, startup, environmental and activism experience. Beyond being the founder of Virgance, he is currently the Chairman of the Board of one of the largest Facebook social gaming application companies, Chairman of the Board of Green Options Media, the founder of SF Green, the Bay Area “unconference†focused on green issues and technology, and a member of the policy committee at the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, working on green issues. He is also well-known as a founder of Powerset, Promptu Mobile (now Promptu) and Loudfire (sold to Nokia undisclosed) and played an important role as an early employee in Proxicom (sold to DiData ~$440 million) and Eastern Energy Corporation (sold to Statoil for ~$2.4 billion).
That being said, what I have done right in my life is to cut my own path and concentrate on doing the biggest things in my life right - then I believe the rest will follow.
So let’s start with the most important thing - my wife. It’s the first and most important thing that I totally did right. The best way I can describe her is she is exactly what I imagined a perfect wife and a perfect marriage would be when I first dreamed of it. She is beautiful, supportive, smart and challenges me on a frequent basis.
Second, I listen, watch, read, research and think about everything and anything. If you have ever met met me there are two things that are a constant. 1) I will be late to our meeting and 2) I will be late to the meeting after I meet you. Why? Because whomever I meet gets 100% of me. I have learned that every person has dreams and every person has a greatness within them. I feel duty bound to find that greatness in others and to empower them to discover it and achieve their goals.
Third, I do what I believe will make me proud when I tell my grandchildren what I did in my life. One of the most useful ways to gain perspective is to imagine your and old fart and your 15 year-old grandkid asks “GrandPa, what were you doing when President Obama got elected and told the world we needed to change everything about the way we govern, the way we do business and the way we live our lives in order to be sustainable.” I for one am not going to be the guy that said I worked at a second rate web 2.0 company called Rakoojoo.
Fourth, I put my money where my mouth is. Two years ago, after realizing the importance of making society sustainable and how much work was needed to get the job done, I left my company that I had founded, called Powerset, to create Virgance. Many people say that we need a project on the size and scale of the Apollo Project to achieve the necessary goals for sustainability, but I disagree. I think we need 500 Apollo Projects. And so I believe that the right question in is not “how do we build an Apollo Project”, but rather “how do we build an Apollo Project factory - and that’s what I am doing. We sold Powerset in May of 2008 for about $100 million and now I am using all of skills, knowledge and resources to build Virgance - which incubates, funds and grows Apollo Projects that are designed to cause 1000x changes in our society - the Twist, we use the power and principle of capitalism (i.e. the one’s I learned building and selling my companies)
So there it is, my version of a proper bio. If you want the typical bio then I guess you could go on the Virgance website or you can go to my linked in profile, but I much prefer this bio.
| Company | Date | Round | Size | Participants |
| 500Friends | 12/09 | Seed | 14 |
