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Insights and Opinions: Idealab and the Bill Gross Legacy

For today's Insights and Opinions section, we thought we'd share a recent article penned by Clearstone Ventures' William Quigley. In all of the recent rush to create internet accelerators in the region, William talks about, Bill Gross, the person behind the "original" tech incubator, Idealab.


I thought I would take an opportunity on this blog to move away from some of the current investment and startup trends, reflect, and dive into the tech history books (as well as my own personal history) by looking at the man and place I believe really put the modern southern California tech community on the map: Bill Gross and Idealab.

Bill’s name is well known within the investment, start-up and tech communities, especially of late with the recent launch of his Chime.In as a social network for brands, but I still don’t think Bill gets nearly enough credit for just how completely innovative Idealab’s model and output was during the time I was there to witness it all. Bill was like a Willy Wonka who didn’t want to confine himself to the chocolate bar, and in my work for Idealab Capital Partners, I felt a bit like Charlie. (Continued...)


Read William's entire post on Idealab, the Roots of the SoCal Tech Community, and the Bill Gross Legacy.