[January 12, 2015]

Institutional Venture Partners Promotes Somesh Dash and Eric Liaw to General Partners

Institutional Venture Partners (IVP), one of the premier later-stage venture capital and growth equity firms, is pleased to announce that Somesh Dash and Eric Liaw have been promoted to General Partners. The promotion recognizes their contributions to IVP and highlights the firm's continued momentum in strengthening its investment team. Mr. Dash and Mr. Liaw join Todd Chaffee, Norm Fogelsong, Steve Harrick, Jules Maltz, Sandy Miller, and Dennis Phelps as the firm's General Partners.

Eric Liaw, General Partner, IVP (Photo: Business Wire)

"Somesh and Eric are leaders within our firm and the venture community. They have built strong CEO relationships and demonstrated a track record of investment success," said Sandy Miller, General Partner at IVP. "They will play a big role in the future of IVP, are a testament to our philosophy of building our organization from within, and we are thrilled to announce their promotions."

Somesh Dash joined IVP in March of 2005 and focuses primarily on later-stage investments in Internet, software, mobile, and technology-enabled services companies. Somesh led IVP's investments in Business Insider, Klout (Lithium), Pure Storage, SoundCloud, and Woven, and was actively involved in IVP's investments in AddThis, AppDynamics, @Road (TRMB), Ayasdi, CafePress (PRSS), Care.com (CRCM), Datalogix, Dropbox (News - Alert), Fleetmatics (FLTX), Hipmunk, LoopNet (CSGP), MySQL (ORCL), Netflix (NFLX), Shazam, TuneIn, ZEFR, and Zynga.

"I met Somesh several years before IVP became an investor in Pure Storage and he understood our long-term goals for scaling Pure very soon after we met," said Scott Dietzen, CEO of Pure Storage. "His experience with growth stage enterprise companies and willingness to help our executive team out has made him an important member of the Pure family. We look forward to continue working with Somesh and IVP in the years to come."

"IVP seeks to identify and back premier growth-stage companies and management teams," said Somesh Dash. "I'm incredibly excited about working with innovative entrepreneurs in the technology sector and partnering with them over the long haul. I'm also privileged to work with the amazing team at IVP and look forward to the years ahead."

Eric Liaw joined IVP in 2011 and focuses on working with high growth companies across a variety of sectors including enterprise software, Internet, and mobile. Eric currently serves as a Board Director or Observer for IVP portfolio companies AdRoll, MindBody, OnDeck (ONDK), Supercell, The Honest Company, Wikia, and ZipRecruiter. He was previously a Director for Dropcam (GOOG) and was instrumental in IVP's investments in Klarna and RetailMeNot (SALE).

"I have known and worked with Eric Liaw for many years, first working with him at LegalZoom and now at The Honest Company," said Brian Lee, CEO & Co-Founder of The Honest Company. "He has always been deeply thoughtful and is one of the brightest partners I have had the pleasure of working with. Eric has experience beyond his years, and knows how to work with entrepreneurs in a truly constructive and positive manner. I will continue to work with Eric for any new venture I start."

"IVP partners with innovative entrepreneurs building dynamic companies like AppDynamics, Dropbox, OnDeck, Pure Storage, Snapchat, Supercell, The Honest Company, and Twitter (News - Alert)," said Eric Liaw. "It is a pleasure and honor to work with both my colleagues at IVP and the management teams of our portfolio companies."

Prior to joining IVP, Somesh worked in Credit Suisse's Technology Investment Banking Group. Earlier, Somesh worked for Luxmi Capital, an early stage venture capital fund focused on digital media investments. He also worked in Corporate Development for Sony Entertainment Television in India. Somesh earned a B.S. in Business Administration from the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley and an M.B.A. from Stanford University.

Prior to joining IVP, Eric was with Technology Crossover Ventures (TCV). Earlier in his career, Eric was a member of Morgan Stanley's Technology Investment Banking Group and also held technical and marketing positions with Trend Micro (News - Alert) and Canon Software Publishing. Eric holds a B.A. in Economics with a minor in Computer Science and an M.S. in Management Science and Engineering, both from Stanford University.

About Institutional Venture Partners (IVP)

With $4 billion of committed capital, Institutional Venture Partners (IVP) is one of the premier later-stage venture capital and growth equity firms in the United States. Founded in 1980, IVP has invested in over 300 companies, 101 of which have gone public. IVP is one of the top-performing firms in the industry and has a 34-year IRR of 43.2%. IVP specializes in venture growth investments, industry rollups, founder liquidity transactions, and select public market investments. Since its inception, IVP investments include such notable companies as AppDynamics, ArcSight (HPQ), Buddy Media (News - Alert) (CRM), ComScore (SCOR), Datalogix, Dropbox, Dropcam (GOOG), Fleetmatics (FLTX), HomeAway (AWAY), Kayak (PCLN), LegalZoom, LifeLock (LOCK), Marketo (MKTO), MySQL (ORCL), ngmoco (News - Alert) (DeNA), OnDeck (ONDK), Pure Storage, RetailMeNot (SALE), Shazam, Snapchat, Supercell, Synchronoss (SNCR), The Honest Company, Twitter (TWTR), and Zynga (ZNGA). For more information, visit http://www.ivp.com or follow IVP on Twitter: @ivp.

Photos/Multimedia Gallery Available: http://www.businesswire.com/multimedia/home/20150112005176/en/

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