UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- "A lot of people ask me, 'So, you're a venture capitalist. How do you predict the future? Like, how do you know Uber would become Uber? How do you know that Google could become Google? Kleiner Perkins funded Google, you were there, how did you know that would happen?' The answer is: You don't. There's no way. Someone had a judgment. If you're an investor, you had a judgment about something.
"You liked the technology, or you liked the entrepreneur. Really, those two factors are the biggest factors. And you just believe — much like the entrepreneur believes — you believe in that technology."
--Ray Lane, keynote speaker at the inaugural Invent Penn State Venture and IP Conference, held on Friday, Oct. 6-7, at the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel on the University Park campus.
Lane is managing partner at GreatPoint Ventures, a fund focused on using resources more efficiently (agriculture, water, energy, etc.), living longer and healthier lives (food, biotechnology, and healthcare), and increasing productivity (robotics, software, etc.). Ray is also partner emeritus and strategic advisor for Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers and and former president and COO of Oracle. Since 2000, Ray has focused on helping entrepreneurs with technological and market insight, organizational development, team building, selling and managing growth.
Hundreds of investors, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and representatives from startup businesses gathered for the conference, a signature program within President Eric Barron’s Invent Penn State initiative, to connect promising startups and emerging technologies with investors looking for ground-floor investment opportunities.