Advisors
Illuminate benefits from a world-class Business Advisory Council made up of more than 40 of the most successful members of the global high tech ecosystem - all of whom work closely with the firm and with the founding teams in our portfolio.
Advisory Council members come from four categories of experience – each with relevance to our enterprise tech focus:
- Tech entrepreneurs that have achieved large, successful outcomes in the enterprise space
- Corporate executives and board members of market-leading enterprise technology companies
- Investors and service providers experienced in achieving strategic exits
- Educators and non-profit Execs that mentor, educate and fund tech entrepreneurs, with a focus on diversity
Nancy Albertini
Co-Chairman, Kingsley Gate Partners; Prior Office of the CEO and Chairman, Kingsley Gate Partners; Prior Managing Partner, Pagemill Partners; Prior Founder, Owner, Chairman, and CEO, Taylor Winfield.
Radha Basu
CEO, iMerit Technology; Dean’s Professor and Director, Frugal Innovation Lab at SCU; Prior Board Vice Chairman, ReSurge Intl; Prior Co-founder, Anudip Foundation; Prior CEO, Support.com; Prior General Manager, HP.
Gerard Brossard
CEO, Denison Consulting; LP, multiple VCs; Board of Advisors and Early Investor, multiple enterprise SaaS start-ups; Prior COO, Rimini Street; Prior EVP and General Manager, Rackspace Solutions and Services; Prior EVP and General Manager, Enterprise Applications Services and OpenStack Public Cloud, Rackspace.
Janice Chaffin
Independent Director, Synopsys, and PTC; Member of the Board of Managers, CareerBuilder; Advisory Board Member, UCLA Anderson School of Management; Prior Board Member, EFI; Prior Board Trustee, Montalvo Arts Center; Prior Operating Committee Member, Ancestry.com; Prior Independent Director, IGT and Informatica.
Caretha Coleman
Chairman, Black Directors Health Equity Agenda; Board Director, Mahmee and The RealReal; Board Member, Facing History & Ourselves, Sobrato Foundation, KIPP Public Schools (N. California), and The Leverage Network; Vice Chairman, Accion Opportunity Fund; Advisor, Black Corporate Board Readiness and African American Director’s Forum
David Coulter
Special Limited Partner, Warburg Pincus; Board Member, Varo Money, ModivCare, and Innovu; Prior Vice Chair, J.P. Morgan Chase; Prior CEO, Bank of America.
Jim Dai
Partner, Altos Ventures; Prior CTO, Coupang; Prior CEO, CalmSea (acquired by Coupang); Prior EIR, Altos Ventures; Prior Senior VP of Engineering & Products, DemandTec; Prior Head of Engineering, Field Services, Siebel; Prior CTO, Vivant!; Prior Senior Vice President of Engineering, DoubleTwist.
Claudia Fan Munce
Chairwoman of the Board, NACD Northern California Chapter; Lecturer in Management, Stanford Graduate School of Business; Board Member, BMO U.S., Arteris, and Best Buy; Venture Advisor, NEA; Prior Board Member, Bank of the West, Parity.Org, CoreLogic, National Venture Capital Association, LAVCA.
Liz Fetter
Board Director, Fox Factory; Founder and Managing Partner, Abundance Hill Enterprises; Principal, Fetter Advisory Services; Prior Board Director, McGrath RentCorp, NACD Northern CA, Cloudstructure, Talend SA, Alliant International University, Symmetricom, Quantum, Ikanos Communications; Prior President & CEO, NxGen Modular, Jacent Technologies, QRS Corporation.
Celeste Ford
Managing Director, Stellar Ventures; Board Chair, Founder, CEO, Stellar Solutions; Member, Board of Trustees, University of Notre Dame; Board Member, Simpson Strong-Tie, Iris Automation Inc, and CHG-Chemring; Advisory Council Member, Enterprising Women.
Sarah Friar
CFO, OpenAI; Board Member, Walmart and ConsenSys; Board Advisor, Stanford Digital Economy Lab, Operation HOPE, and Blavatnik School of Government at University of Oxford; Co-launcher, Ladies Who Launch; Prior CEO, Nextdoor; Prior Board Member, Slack and New Relic; Prior CFO, Square; Prior SVP, Finance, Salesforce.
Earl Fry
Member, Board of Directors, Backblaze and Central Pacific Financial Corp.; Prior Member, Board of Directors, Hawaiian Airlines and Xactly Corp; Prior Interim CFO and Advisor, Informatica; Prior Chief Customer Officer and EVP-Operations Strategy, Informatica; Prior Chief Financial Officer, Informatica.
Ken Goldman
President, Hillspire LLC; Board Member, GoPro, RingCentral, Zuora, and Value Reporting Foundation; Prior Chief Financial Officer, Yahoo! Inc.; Prior SVP and CFO, Fortinet; Prior Member, PCAOB Standing Advisory Group; Prior Member, FASB’s Primary Advisory Group.
Nancy Heinen
Board Member, Empower Work; Chair of the Board of Directors, First Place for Youth, SV2 Silicon Valley Social Venture Fund; Senior Fellow, American Leadership Forum Silicon Valley; Advisor, Duarte Inc.; Advisory Board Member, Northern California Innocence Project, UC Berkeley Center for Law and Business, and Lab4U
Cliff Higgerson
Advisor, Artiman Ventures and Walden; Prior Co-Founder/General Partner, ComVentures and Vanguard Ventures; Prior Managing Partner, H&Q.
Sabrina Horn
Certified Executive Coach; Advisor, Oppenheimer Energy; Board Member, TadHealth and 4CRisk.ai; Professor and Affiliate Faculty, Emerson College; CEO, HORN Strategy, LLC; Senior Advisor, Technology Practice, Finn Partners; Advisory Board Member, Dogly and JEGI CLARITY; Partner/Owner, Millennium Play LLC.
Amal Johnson
Board Member, Intuitive Surgical and Essex Property Trust; Prior Chairman of the Board, CalAmp; Prior Board Member, Author-it and Mellanox Technologies; Prior Chairman & CEO, MarketTools; Prior Executive VP, Verity; Prior VP & GM, Dell; Prior VP, IBM.
Robin Joy
Executive VP, Partnership for San Francisco; Operating Advisor, Bessemer Venture Partners; Limited Partner, Operator Collective; Prior Board Member, Acumatica; Prior SVP, Global Alliances & Partner Development, DocuSign; Prior VP, Marketing, Caring.com; Prior Director, QuickBooks.
Michele Klein
CEO, Jasper Ridge; Co-Founder, Gridtential Energy; Prior Senior Director, Applied Ventures; Prior CEO, Boxer Cross; Prior management positions, Knoll and HP.
Tom Kosnik, Ph.D.
Partner, FoundersX Ventures; Investor, Kapital, LunaJoy Health, Turion Space, Orbillion Bio, 1910 Genetics, and Markable AI; Consulting Professor, NUS Overseas Colleges; Adjunct Professor, Stanford University; Prior Judge, YouNoodle; Prior Managing Director, TCG Advisors.
Jean Kovacs
Partner, Hillsven; Co-Chair, Harvard Business School Alumni Angels Association; Prior Board Member, ALW and Survox; Prior President, HBSAAA of Northern California; Prior Board of Trustees, Compass High School Bay Area; Prior Interim CEO, Somersault Orthopedics; Prior SVP, Corporate Marketing & Strategic Alliances, Sterling Commerce.
Kira Makagon
Chief Innovation Officer & CMO, RingCentral; Board Member, Calix; Member, Athena Alliance; Prior Founder & CEO/President and Board Member, Red Aril; Prior Co-Founder & President/CEO and Board Member, NebuAd; Prior President, Ventures & Alliances and EVP Marketing & Business Devt, Exigen Group.
Amy Millman
Managing Partner, StageNext LLC; Ambassador, SBE Australia; EIR, Georgetown Entrepreneurship; EIR, Yale University; Advisory Board, Enterprising Women Magazine; Founder, Springboard 2000 Enterprises Inc; Prior Board Member, Women In Bio; Prior President, Springboard Enterprises; Prior Co-producer, New York Fashion Tech Lab.
Carol Mills
Member, Board of Directors, Entertainment Partners and Zynga; Prior Member, Board of Directors, Xactly, Ingram Micro, Alaska Communications Systems Group, Bluecoat, Adobe, and Tekelec International.
Rebecca Norlander
Co-Founder, Stealth AI Startup; Member, Board of Trustees, Boston University; Prior Advisory Board Member, Boston University, Lyfebank; Prior VP of Software, Personal Systems, HP; Prior CEO, Samepage Health; Prior Board Director, AAUW; Prior Co-Founder & CEO, Health123; Prior General Manager, Microsoft.
Donna Petkanics
Retired Corporate Partner, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati; Prior Managing Director, Operations, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.
Ron Rasmussen
Founder & Chief Technology Officer, Latitude 39, Inc.; Strategic Advisor and Prior Chief Technology Officer, Xactly Corp; Prior VP Engineering, Incent Right and Quova; Prior VP Engineering, Lithium Technologies; Prior CTO & VP Engineering, KnowNow..
Janice Roberts
Partner, BGV; Public Board Member, ARM Holdings plc, Zebra Technologies Inc, and RealNetworks Corporation; President, Board of Directors, Ronald McDonald House at Stanford; Prior Managing Director, Mayfield Fund; Prior Senior Vice President, Global Marketing and Business Development, 3Com Ventures.
Judy Robinett
Founder & President, JRobinett Enterprises; Advisor, Consultant, and Speaker; Prior CEO, MDI Group; Prior Managing Director, Golden Seeds; Prior Executive Director, InVectus (Daisyclip); Prior Director, Willowbend Partners; Author of Crack the Funding Code and How to Be a Power Connector; Award-winning business book author; Keynote Speaker.
Sanjay Sadhu
Head of Sales, Auradine; Strategic Advisor, AI Innovation Advisors; Prior VP & GM Global Sales, Alliances and OEM Partnerships, Hitachi Vantara; Prior Managing Director - Sales, Hewlett Packard Enterprise; Prior Partner and Advisor, InSinu Advisors; Prior Sr. Director, Global Alliances & Channels and Embedded Sales, Oracle.
Avanish Sahai
Fellow, Stanford Center on Longevity; Board Member, Birdie, Flywl, and Meta (Brazil); Venture Partner, SynapseVC; Tidemark Fellow and Host, The Platform Journey; Mentor Capitalist, Exbourne Group; Prior Fellow, Stanford Distinguished Careers Institute; Prior Board Member and Audit Committee, HubSpot; Prior Corporate Vice President, Google.
Sonali Sambhus
Startup Advisor and Fractional CTO, Thrrive Ventures; Board Member, AvidXchange; Prior SVP/Head of Developer & Machine Learning Platform, Square; Prior Board Director, CommonBond; Prior Head of Consumer Engineering, Realtor.com; Prior VP, Engineering, Vuclip; Prior Co-Founder, 10jumps; Prior Co-founder, Cisco.
Lucy Sanders
Founder & Executive in Residence, NCWIT (National Center for Women & IT); Trustee, Center for American Entrepreneurship, Colorado School of Mines, and International Computer Science Institute; Executive-in-Residence, ATLAS Institute at University of Colorado Boulder; Prior VP of R&D and CTO, Avaya Labs..
Nancy Schoendorf
General Partner, Mohr Davidow Ventures; Board Member, Shutterfly and several private companies; Prior engineering and engineering management roles, Hewlett-Packard; Prior Officer and Vice President of R&D and Product Development, Software Publishing Corp.
Leyla Seka
Co-Founder, Side Project HQ; Chair, Operator Collective; Co-Founder, Black Venture Institute; Member, Board of Trustees, Oakland Museum of California; Board Member, UC Berkeley Coleman Fung Institute for Engineering Leadership; Prior Board Member, Girls Who Code and SetSail; Prior COO, Ironclad.
Steve Strandberg
Co-Founder, Managing Partner, and Board Member, Albany Road Real Estate Partners; Director, Crescent Capital BDC; Director, U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Foundation; President, U.S. Ski and Snowboard Foundation.
Shanna Tellerman
CPO, Lennar; Member, YPO; Prior Founder and CEO, Modsy; Prior Partner, Google Ventures; Prior Product Line Manager, Cloud Platform and Services, Autodesk; Prior Founder and CEO, Wild Pockets; Prior Project Manager, Entertainment Technology Center at Carnegie Mellon University.
Jim Yu
Founder & Executive Chair, BrightEdge; Prior Founder & CEO, BrightEdge; Prior Director, Product Management, Salesforce; Prior Venture Consultant, Kleiner Perkins and Sasson Capital; Prior Acting Director, Product Development, Mercator Software (now IBM); Prior Group Product Manager, Aether Systems.