Current Investments
Philip "Flip" Gianos has been part of InterWest's IT team since 1982. With a background in engineering, he has invested in multiple areas of information technology, including semiconductors, computing and networking equipment, and infrastructure and applications software. He is chairman of the board of Xilinx (XLNX), a publicly held company, and is also a board member of several privately held companies, including: Bivio Networks, Brand.net, Convey Computer, and SpectraLinear. Gianos also serves on the advisory board of both Storm Ventures II and the Global Semiconductor Alliance, and is a past president of the Western Association of Venture Capitalists.
Prior to joining InterWest, Gianos was with IBM for eight years in engineering management. He managed both chip design and systems integration for several IBM office automation products.
Gianos earned his M.B.A. from Harvard University and received his M.S. and B.S. in electrical engineering from Stanford University. He has one international and two U.S. patents.
Previous Representative Investments
CIENA (CIEN)
Copper Mountain Networks – acquired as a public company by TUT Systems (TUTS)
Edify – acquired as a public company by Security First Technologies Corp. (SONE)
Kalpana – acquired by Cisco (CSCO)
Lightera – acquired by CIENA (CIEN)
Nanogen (NGEN)
Network Computing Devices (NCDI)
PlaceWare – acquired by Microsoft
(MSFT)
Power Integrations (POWI)
Ramp Networks – acquired as a public company by
Nokia (NOK)
Rendition – acquired by Micron Technology (MU)
SiTera – acquired by Vitesse (VTSS)
Stratacom – acquired as a public company by
Cisco Systems (CSCO)
T/R Systems – acquired as a public company by
Electronics for Imaging,
Inc (EFII)
A Word from Flip
"Working with the entrepreneurial CEO is my favorite part of venture capital. A CEO can often feel isolated; I try to be someone who will take the time, listen, exchange ideas, and occasionally coax people through difficult decisions. It is difficult for a board member to contribute at the detailed operational level - management should manage the company.
However, over the years, working with many companies, we can make management aware of the patterns they may not see; our experience with similar situations combined with management's experience with the specifics makes for a better decision."
