Social Capital in Silicon Valley

Startups and the entrepreneurs who found them are not born in a vacuum. Their business models, products, and core values constitute an expression of the unique cultural time and place in which they come of age. Silicon Valley’s and China’s…

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Network effects of success : Silicon Valley is famous for its “mafias.” As companies sell or IPO for billions of dollars, they make many of their employees very wealthy. Those employees form new companies, support each other, and invest in the next generation of companies. ThePayPal Mafia, Silicon Valley’s most famous, includes entrepreneurs who w

Why did these patterns persist, even as women and minorities made significant inroads into other professional domains? The explanation lies with the characteristic of the Valley VC community that set it apart from other regions, and that made it so good at finding and nurturing one generation of entrepreneurs after another: its personal, tightly ne