Heidi Roizen makes Operating Partner at DFJ

Her new role underscores VC firms' increasing move to add value-added mentoring, services

After joining the Silicon Valley venture capital firm DFJ back in 2012 as a venture partner, Heidi Roizen has been promoted to operating partner, a role that will position her as the in-house expert on marketing and business development to the DFJ portfolio companies.

Roizen's promotion comes around the same time the firm closed its $325 million early-stage fund, called DFJ Venture XI, and saw two of its founding partnes Tim Draper and John Fischer step down investment roles. Draper, who went to Stanford with Roizen, has moved on to focus on Draper University, a college for entrepreneurs. He and Fischer leave a pretty good legacy. Since inception, DFJ has seen 22 companies that have achieved $1 billion in market value, including Baidu, AdMob, Box, Skype, Hotmail, Tesla, SolarCity, Twitter, Tumblr and Yammer. 

Importantly, Roizen's role underscores how venture capitalists are positioning themselves as providers of holistic services - not just capital. See my interview with Josh Kopelman.  

"We've built a few areas of strength in marketing and talent around a few great people and we hope that provides some great leverage for our portfolio companies," said Roizen, in an interview with me. "I also think when it comes to business development, we can provide help opening doors and helping people know what to ask for when they get through them." 

Roizen is certainly someone who can open doors for startups, given her network and experience. Currently, she serves on the boards of Tivo and DMGT, and DFJ portfolio companies XTime, Eventful, and ShareThis. Prior to joining the nearly 30-year-old firm, Roizen was a venture capitalist at Mobius Venture Capital. She was also an entrepreneur herself, having started T/Maker in 1983.

Heidi Roizen, Josh Stein (DFJ Partner) and Tim Draper will be joining Vator on stage at Vator Splash Oakland! Both Stein and Roizen will be judges! Apply to present on stage. https://vator.tv/events/splash-oak-may-2014

Disclosure: Roizen and I are related (if you couldn't figure that out by our last names).Her nephew Ezra Roizen is my husband.