For 29 years, Gerry has served as a Managing Director with OVP Venture Partners, the most successful venture capital firm in the Pacific Northwest. OVP is finishing its 38th year, with its seventh fund (OVP VII) at $250 million. Since its founding in 1983, the partnership has backed over 125 startups – and seen over 50 liquidity events including 25 IPOs with more than 30 others being acquired by public companies. From 1981 to 1992, Gerry was co-founder of Mentor Graphics Corporation (NASDAQ: MENT) where he served as President and Board member. He helped lead Mentor to over $400M in sales and $1B in market capitalization, ranking it as one of the largest and most profitable of all U.S. companies founded in the 1980s. He is the author of The Success Matrix – Winning in Business and in Life (Logos Press – press date March 2014), Take the Money and Run! An Insider’s Guide to Venture Capital (Smashwords and Lulu Press, 2011) and The Vision Trap (Harvard Business Review, March 1992), which continues to be widely used in business schools and corporate training sessions. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Novomer and Group 14 Technologies. He holds a BA, Chemistry from Cornell University, and a MBA from Harvard.