Kleiner Perkins

At a glance

Founded

1972, Menlo Park, California (first tenant of 3000 Sand Hill Road)

Founders

Eugene Kleiner (Fairchild Semiconductor co-founder) and Tom Perkins (Hewlett-Packard); Frank Caufield and Brook Byers became name partners in 1977–78 (Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, "KPCB")

Headquarters

Menlo Park, CA; San Francisco office; historically KPCB China (Shanghai/Beijing), now independent

Ownership / structure

Private partnership; renamed "Kleiner Perkins" in 2019; early-stage KP funds plus "KP Select" growth funds

Leadership (2026)

Mamoon Hamid and Ilya Fushman lead the investing partnership; John Doerr is chairman; Brook Byers remains associated as a founding-era partner

AUM / capital raised

~$21bn reported AUM (2026); ~$2bn raised in 2024 (KP21 $825m, KP Select III $1.2bn); ~$3.5bn reported in 2026 (KP22 ~$1bn + ~$2.5bn growth) (verify)

Stage focus

Seed to Series B (KP funds); growth/inflection rounds (KP Select); historically also late-stage growth (Digital Growth Fund) and cleantech growth

Signature investments

Tandem Computers, Genentech, Compaq, Electronic Arts, Sun Microsystems, Lotus, Intuit, Netscape, @Home, Amazon, Juniper Networks, Cerent, Google, Nest, Twitter (growth), Figma, Rippling, Glean, Harvey; failures and misses: GO Corp, @Home (post-merger), Fisker Automotive, Miasolé, Amyris, much of the 2006–2012 cleantech book, late-stage DGF entries

11 deals and moves analysed

Each one gets a full strategy file in the companion: context, the decision, the financing, what happened, and the lesson.

1. 1974

   Tandem Computers

   Incubation and Founding Round

2. 1976

   Genentech

   Seed and Early Rounds

3. 1982

   Sun Microsystems

   Series A

4. 1994

   Netscape

   Series A

5. 1996

   Amazon

   Venture Round

6. 1997

   Cerent

   Series A

7. 1999

   Google

   Series A

8. 2002

   Bloom Energy

   Series A

9. 2008

   Fisker Automotive

   Early Venture Round

10. 2010

    Nest Labs

    Series A

11. 2019

    Figma

    Series C