Kleiner Perkins

Kleiner Perkins is the firm that started Sand Hill Road's reputation. When it opened there in 1972, the stretch of Menlo Park road was a quiet edge of Stanford land. Over the next three decades the firm backed Genentech, Sun Microsystems, Netscape, Amazon and Google and became, in the words of The New York Times in 2005, perhaps Silicon Valley's most famous venture firm. It then went through a long period of change before rebuilding around a new team.

This profile is a neutral explainer for visitors and founders. It relies on the firm's website, SEC filings and reporting from Bloomberg, TechCrunch and others. Our venture capital guide explains how firms like this raise and invest money.

Eugene Kleiner and Tom Perkins

The two founders came from the companies that built the region's electronics industry. Eugene Kleiner was one of the eight engineers who left Shockley Semiconductor in Mountain View in 1957 to start Fairchild Semiconductor, a story told in our guide to Shockley, Fairchild and the semiconductor boom. Tom Perkins had been an executive at Hewlett-Packard.

They founded the firm in 1972. Frank Caufield and Brook Byers joined as name partners. For decades the firm was known as Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, often shortened to KPCB. Byers joined in 1977 and is still listed on the firm's website as a founder. The name was later shortened to Kleiner Perkins.

First on Sand Hill Road

Kleiner Perkins is generally described as the first venture capital firm to open an office on Sand Hill Road. Its success attracted other firms to the area. In the mid 1970s it moved much of its work to downtown San Francisco but later brought most of it back to Menlo Park. Our Sand Hill Road guide tells the rest of the story.

Tandem, Genentech and the early bets

The firm's early approach was hands-on. Partners helped found and run companies, not only fund them.

• Tandem Computers. A maker of fault-tolerant computers for banks and other businesses that could not afford downtime. It became one of the firm's first big successes.
• Genentech. Founded in 1976 by Robert Swanson, a former Kleiner Perkins associate, together with the scientist Herbert Boyer. It is often called the first biotechnology company and showed that venture capital could fund life sciences.
• Sun Microsystems. Kleiner Perkins provided $300,000 in seed money when Sun started in 1982.
• Others. The 1980s portfolio also included Compaq, Electronic Arts and Lotus Development.

The Netscape, Amazon and Google era

By the 1990s John Doerr, who joined the firm in 1980, had become its best known partner. The firm put money into many of the companies that built the commercial internet.

Bloomberg still describes the firm as best known for its early bets on Google and Amazon. The Google connection runs through Palo Alto, where the company worked out of a small downtown office in 1999 before moving to Mountain View. See our page on Google's Palo Alto years.

The cleantech years

In the late 2000s the firm made a large bet on clean energy. It raised a $500 million green growth fund around 2008. Former Vice President Al Gore joined as a partner in 2007. Returns from cleantech across the industry were mixed. The push was widely reported as a difficult period for the firm. Al Gore is listed today as an advisor.

The 2018 split

On September 14, 2018, Kleiner Perkins confirmed that its growth investing team would leave. Mary Meeker, known for her annual Internet Trends report, led the group with partners Mood Rowghani, Noah Knauf and Juliet de Baubigny. They started a separate firm, which became Bond. The managing partner at the time described the split as amicable and said the late-stage team's work had diverged from the firm's core venture business.

Kleiner Perkins kept its early-stage practice. It rebuilt around Mamoon Hamid and Ilya Fushman, who had joined in 2017 and 2018. Both are listed as partners on the firm's website today. Bloomberg's March 2026 coverage of the firm's new funds featured both.

Kleiner Perkins today

The firm now raises two kinds of funds at a time: a numbered early-stage fund and a growth fund called Select. In 2024 it raised its 21st venture fund and its third Select fund, together reported at more than $2 billion. In March 2026 Bloomberg reported a new raise of $3.5 billion, made up of $1 billion for its 22nd early-stage fund plus $2.5 billion for growth investments. Both are aimed largely at artificial intelligence companies across software, health care, transportation and autonomy.

The website lists John Doerr as chairman and Brook Byers as founder, alongside a partner group that includes Hamid, Fushman and others. The firm also runs the KP Fellows program, which places university students in startup internships. It also has an operating team that supports portfolio companies with engineering, marketing, finance and business development.

Kleiner Perkins timeline

1. 1972: Eugene Kleiner and Tom Perkins found the firm and open on Sand Hill Road.
2. 1976: Genentech is founded with backing from the firm.
3. 1977: Brook Byers joins.
4. 1980: John Doerr joins.
5. 1982: The firm provides seed money to Sun Microsystems.
6. 1994: It invests in Netscape.
7. 1999: It invests in Google alongside Sequoia.
8. 2007: Al Gore joins as a partner during the cleantech push.
9. 2018: The growth team leaves to start what became Bond.
10. 2024: The firm raises its 21st venture fund and a new Select growth fund.
11. 2026: Bloomberg reports $3.5 billion in new funds aimed largely at AI.

The office

Kleiner Perkins describes itself as headquartered on Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park. The firm's June 2024 SEC filing for its 21st fund lists the address as 2750 Sand Hill Road. The building is a private office in the cluster of firms near Interstate 280. You can drive past, but there is nothing to see inside and no reason to stop without an appointment.

For founders visiting the area

Founders meeting Kleiner Perkins usually stack several Sand Hill Road meetings on the same day. The firms are only minutes apart by car, but transit along the road is thin, so a car or rideshare is easiest. Compare rental cars if you are flying into SFO or San Jose. Stay in downtown Palo Alto or Menlo Park to keep drives short. Compare hotels near Sand Hill Road early, since Stanford events push up rates. Our guide to pitching investors covers how to prepare.

Frequently asked questions