Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers

Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers is a Silicon Valley venture capital (VC) firm. For over five decades, Kleiner Perkins (previously known as Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers) has invested in technology and life science companies.

The firm has backed companies such as Sun Microsystems, Compaq Computer Corp., Lotus, Netscape Communications Corp., America Online Inc., and Amazon with a combined market cap of about $650 billion. KP's partners assemble management teams and often sit on boards of the companies they sponsor. An informal version of the Japanese "keiretsu" system encourages resource sharing and deal making among KP-backed companies.

Over the past 50 years, Kleiner Perkins has invested $10 billion in hundreds of companies like Amazon, Google and Genentech.

KP tries to eliminate risk in all areas of ventures: technological risk, financial risk, operating risk, and market risk. In its first decade, Kleiner Perkins invested in about 50 companies, mostly high-tech Silicon Valley start-ups, through three funds totaling $78 million. These funds were reportedly averaging annual returns of 50 percent.

One of KPCB's more notorious investments of the decade was in Go Corporation, whose purpose was developing a pen-operated computer. The company collapsed after spending six years and $75 million on the project. KPCB VI, the firm's sixth fund, raised $173 million in 1992; it returned $878 million in the next ten years.

KPCB China's investment advisory team was founded in 2007 with the goal of building a dialog between entrepreneurs and investors in China. Kleiner Perkins focus their global investments in China due to China's rapidly growing economy and startup culture. The advisory team operates independently and focuses on Digital, Green Tech and Life science opportunities. The investment advisory team is focused on identifying and promoting innovation and supporting entrepreneurs and portfolio companies.