The qualities needed to be a Silicon Valley founder revealed

It matters to have a degree and be in your 40s when it comes to being a founder of a successful company in Silicon Valley.

What makes a top Silicon Valley founder has been revealed for the first time.

And the most likely winners are most likely to be in their 40s, white and holding a degree from Stanford- hardly surprising.

University education makes a difference

Founders were most likely to graduate from Ivy league university Stanford, with 22 founders graduating from the university as well as Yale (nine). However, most graduated from universities marked as ‘Other’ (71) such as Queen’s (Elon Musk) and Pepperdine University (Julia Hartz – CEO of Eventbrite).

Marc Benioff, founder of Salesforce graduated from the University of Southern California in 1986; Benioff was raised in the San Francisco Bay area – unusual for a Silicon Valley CEO.

Leah Busque, the founder of Task Rabbit, graduated from Sweet Briar College and is 38 years of age while Evan Williams, co-founder of Twitter attended the university of Nebraska Lincoln and is 46 years old.

Anne Wojcicki,45, is founder of direct to consumer genetics site 23andMe is currently fundraising $300 million and graduated from Yale.

Silicon Valley’s most famous founder, Steve Jobs also graduated from Stanford.

The data shows that there is a long way to go when it comes to making a mark in the world of tech and Silicone Valley

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According to the data by The Silicon Valley 100,just 10 per cent of founders are female while 38 per cent had founded just one organisation, although most worked with a co-founder – debunking the myth that the successful entrepreneur is a single-minded individual hell bent on his/her vision ahead of all.

Mark Zuckerburg is the youngest founder in Silicon at 34 years of age while Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix is one of the oldest founders at 58.

Michael Somerville

Michael Somerville

Michael was senior reporter for GrowthBusiness.co.uk from 2018 to 2019.

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