Dan’l Lewin’s wealth of experience is probably best summed up by how he worked as an early employee of technology company Apple in 1977, the period when it became the first company to develop the personal computer.
Lewin now oversees Microsoft’s BizSpark programme to support start-ups as corporate vice-president.
Lewin said: “I was part of [Apple’s] Macintosh division at inception where I set up Apple’s higher education business from scratch, then a co-founder at NeXT, with Steve Jobs. I then held leadership roles with various start-ups and corporate joint ventures – Apple and IBM. I did some consulting work with Silicon Valley venture firms and have now been at Microsoft since 2001, where I focus on leading our Silicon Valley operations and running our global outreach and initiatives for engaging the venture and start-up ecosystem.”
He added: “We have a growing set of cross-company efforts to engage and work more deeply with entrepreneurs and the investor community to present our new devices and services as opportunities for partnership with start-ups, along with new opportunities around Kinect and other technologies such as Bing.”
These cross-company efforts include a corporate venturing programme at Microsoft’s Skype online phone and video operator, a dedicated fund for Bing and BizSpark, which gives software start-ups three-year access to Microsoft software development tools, marketing visibility, technical support, business training and a network of more than 2,000 partners to connect members with incubators, investors, advisers, government agencies and hosters.
Since it was established in 2008, more than 45,000 companies in more than 100 countries have joined BizSpark.
Lessons from the top: Lewin said: “Corporate venturing – as opposed to corporate venture capital – is hard to do well, but an essential element for driving change and growth. Aligning a large business like Microsoft, or any other, to work closely with a young company requires careful and focused effort. It should be aligned closely with the business strategy.”
