James D. Robinson

Since becoming a VC in 1992, Jim has led investments in and served on the boards of more than forty technology companies, with a current focus on enterprise and consumer applications, web services, data analytics, and financial technologies. He often invests in businesses that leverage network effects and crowd-intelligence. Jim is currently a Director of Boom Financial, GetGlue, Netsertive, OLO.com, OpenPeak, Quirky, SmartPay, and WisdomTree ($WETF), and advises several seed companies, including Affinity China and Amicus.

While earning a degree in Business Administration and Computer Science at Antioch College during the early 1980's, Jim worked as an engineering intern in the solar power group at General Electric; as a programmer for Illinois state government; and later as an analyst for the 1984 Reagan Campaign.  During his third year in college, he founded and was President of IV Systems, which created unix-based apps for businesses using Fortune Systems workstations.  

In 1986, Jim joined J.P. Morgan, where he spent four years working on technology-related assignments, initially helping develop a global risk-management system, and then as an investment banker in corporate finance. Jim earned an MBA from Harvard in 1992, and subsequently joined Hambrecht & Quist Venture Capital in San Francisco.  Working nights and weekends, Jim co-founded InterVideo Response with Stuart Ellman in early 1994, which attempted to build in-stadium touchscreen ordering systems. In the days before wifi, they were ten years too early.  After deciding against launching a second business involving veterinary services, the two started their own VC firm in the fall of 1994.

Jim is involved in several non-profit endeavors, and has a particular interest in the issues & rights affecting children.  He is a Director of the New York City Investment Fund (NYCIF-NYCP), the NYC Seed Program, and on the Advisory Board of the National Association on Drug Abuse Problems. Jim has been a member of the Young President's Organization (YPO) since 1998.  He is also a CERT first-responder.  Jim was rumored to have founded a stealth national campaign-technology company in 2007 to help build a viable third-party alternative in the U.S.  Importantly, he's a dog person.