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9 Splash Points
6 followers
1 company followed
2 competitions judged
6 followers
1 company followed
2 competitions judged
Following
Followers
Cindy Padnos
Founder & Managing Partner, Illuminate Ventures
www.illuminate.com
Oakland, California, United States
Business owner, Investor
Member since January 14, 2010
VEQ: MM-NW-FR
Investor interests
| Type of investor | Accelerator |
| Typical investment size | $500k - $1M |
| Typical investments in a year | 3 |
| Investments made | BrightEdge, Xactly, CalmSea, Hoopla, Red Aril, WildPockets, Digital Chocolate, Reply |
| Investments partners | Alloy Ventures, Bay Partners, Bridgescale, Altos, Battery, INtel Capital, Rembrandt, Trinity, Sierra, Salesforce.com, Safeguard |
| Credentials | Accredited Investor, Qualified Purchaser |
I am a(n):
Investor
Companies I've founded or co-founded:
Vivant Corporation, Illuminate Ventures
Startups I worked for:
Scopus Technology, Acumen International, Ingres, Vivant, IDE
If you are an entrepreneur, why?
It's what I am best at....so even as an investor I chose to do something unique and entrepreneurial.
My favorite startups:
BrightEdge, CalmSea, Xactly, Hoopla
What's most frustrating and rewarding about entrepreneurship/innovation?
Most frustrating - how long it sometimes takes to know if what you are doing will be successful or not.
Most rewarding - having someone tell you about a cool company or product they recently saw .....and it's one you helped build or invested in.
What's the No. 1 mistake entrepreneurs make?
Thinking that great technology "wins" by itself.
What are the top three lessons you've learned as an entrepreneur?
1. Be willing to look reality in the eye and then decide, consciously, when to ignore it.
2. Focus, focus, focus
3. Be passionate about customer/user/ feedback and satisfaction.
Full bio
Cindy Padnos is founder and managing partner of Illuminate Ventures, an early stage Micro VC firm focused on cloud computing. Current investments and board seats include BrightEdge, CalmSea, Hoopla, and Xactly. Cindy has deployed over $100 million in venture funding to help dozens of innovative start-ups reach successful outcomes including prior portfolio companies Red Aril (acquired by Hearst Corporation) and WildPockets (acquired by Autodesk).
Named one of the Most Influential Women in Technology (Fast Company) and one of the Most Influential Women in Business in the Bay Area (San Francisco Business Times), Cindy’s prior high tech career includes successful stints as a management consultant, operating executive (Scopus) and founder/CEO (Vivant).
Cindy is a member of the Board of Advisors for Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business where she received her MBA/MSIA and a graduate of the University of Michigan where she recently offered the College of Engineering commencement address.
