{"id":20588,"date":"2018-03-13T16:03:09","date_gmt":"2018-03-13T20:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/company\/stories\/cornelltechbloomberg-three-leading-vcs-discuss-career-paths-e-commerce-virtual-reality\/"},"modified":"2025-06-03T08:35:32","modified_gmt":"2025-06-03T12:35:32","slug":"cornelltechbloomberg-three-leading-vcs-discuss-career-paths-e-commerce-virtual-reality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/company\/stories\/cornelltechbloomberg-three-leading-vcs-discuss-career-paths-e-commerce-virtual-reality\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Leading Female VCs Discuss Career Paths, E-Commerce, and Virtual Reality"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Budding venture capitalists and entrepreneurs alike found lots to chew on at the latest CornellTech@Bloomberg discussion, held at Bloomberg\u2019s Global Headquarters in New York City on Wednesday, February 28, 2018. The event featured an introduction by Bloomberg Beta’s Karin Klein, after which Bloomberg TV anchor Scarlet Fu spoke with Ellie Wheeler, partner at Greycroft, Rebecca Kaden, partner with Union Square Ventures, and Beth Ferreira, managing director at FirstMark Capital. The panelists discussed their own career paths, the areas they see as most promising for investment, and, of course, those that appear overhyped.<\/p>\n

All three emphasized that their career journey to venture capital had been circuitous, and that there is no single best way to become a VC. Kaden started out as a journalist, and soon became fascinated by the intersection of technology and online content, and how digital publishers could ever make money. That propelled her to business school, where her mentor, Silicon Valley’s legendary ‘coach,’ Bill Campbell, suggested she might like venture capital. Campbell was also a close advisor to VC firm Maveron, where Kaden spent six years before joining Union Square Ventures last October.<\/p>\n

Ferreira started off as an investment banker, and caught the startup bug when she was helping a smaller company raise money. \u201cThey were thinking about the big things and working all the time. It was a big wakeup call,\u201d she says. She joined Flatiron Partners in 1998, and saw the rise of the dotcom boom followed by a contraction that halved the size of the venture industry. Eventually, she too lost her job, and went to business school. Then she took senior operating roles at fast-growing startups \u2013 notably Etsy and Fab.com \u2013 before returning to venture capital.<\/p>\n

Wheeler had a brief stint in medical school before deciding, just before the first-semester finals, that a career in medicine wasn’t right for her. She then joined a private equity firm in Boston, worked in corporate development at Cisco, went to business school, and eventually, became a venture capitalist. \u201cThere isn\u2019t one path,\u201d said Wheeler. \u201cIt\u2019s not, first you do this for two years, then you get into a private equity fund or a hedge fund. It\u2019s not something formulaic like that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n<\/div>\n