Postcards
Meeker's smart call on Amazon: VC chops?
November 30, 2010: 1:52 PM ETby Patricia Sellers
Many people are asking: Will Internet analyst Mary Meeker be savvy enough at spotting brand-new businesses to succeed as a venture capitalist in Silicon Valley?
Quitting Morgan Stanley (MS), where she's worked for 19 years, to become a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers is a major career switch. "Will I be good at this?" is one of several questions she asked herself, Meeker, 51, told me yesterday.
The question is fair for anyone to ask since Meeker's mojo -- and stature as one of Fortune's Smartest People in Tech -- lies mainly in spotting mega-trends (her 424-page report on the mobile Internet was on every techie's reading list a year ago) and analyzing companies just before they go public and after the stock is trading.
As I said yesterday in my Postcard on Meeker's move, Morgan Stanley CFO Ruth Porat claims that Meeker is so good at "seeing around corners" that she'll thrive in her new West-coast gig. Porat recalls that in the late '90s when she was an investment banker working with Meeker to finance startups such as AOL (AOL) and eBay (EBAY), Morgan Stanley couldn't work with Amazon.com (AMZN) on its IPO because Barnes & Noble (BKS) was a client. Meeker's prediction at the time: Amazon's stock-market value would exceed Barnes & Noble's sometime soon after the IPO.
This was the spring of 1997, one year after Meeker had garnered fame by publishing the first of her analytical tomes on the future of the Internet. But as she contended that Amazon would revolutionize customer relationship-building as well as book-selling, most people thought her prognostication was nuts. How could a tiny Internet retailer possibly supplant a national bookstore giant.
It happened, by measure of market cap, in just over a year. Amazon's stock-market value surpassed B&N's on June 9, 1998. Both companies were worth about $2.4 billion then.
And today? Amazon is worth $78.8 billion. Barnes & Noble: $829 million.
P.S. This evening, I'll be interviewing Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Carol Bartz at a Fortune Most Powerful Women dinner in Silicon Valley. What should I ask Bartz? Please suggest questions. Click here if you'd like to watch the Bartz interview live on Tuesday at 8 p.m. PST.
Related stories:
Talking Mary Meeker and tech investing with Kleiner Perkins' Ted Schlein
Why Morgan Stanley's Meeker is moving to Silicon Valley
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Why Morgan Stanley's Meeker is moving to Silicon Valley
by Patricia Sellers
When Internet analyst Mary Meeker announced at Morgan Stanley's Monday morning meeting today that she's leaving to become a venture capitalist at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, most people were surprised.
But to those who know Meeker, the so-called Queen of the 'Net since the late '90s, her move from Wall Street to Silicon Valley is a long time coming.
I mentioned this "rumor" (will Meeker leave Morgan Stanley to MORE
Patricia Sellers - Nov 29, 2010 5:18 PM ETPosted in: Google, Juliet de Baubigny, Kleiner Perkins, Mary Meeker, Morgan Stanley, Postcards, Silicon Valley, technology, Wall Street, Yahoo -
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Patricia Sellers - Jul 25, 2008 2:16 PM ETPosted in: CEOs, Christine Day, Cisco, eBay, Erin Callan, FORTUNE MPWomen, Gap, Genentech, Google, Hillary Clinton, Kleiner Perkins, KPMG, Leadership by Geoff Colvin, leadership style, lululemon athletica, management, Most Powerful Women, MPWomen, Padmasree Warrior, Paula Rosput Reynolds, Postcards, SAFECO, Stephanie Tilenius, Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, Susan Hellman, women leaders, Zoe Cruz
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Fortune senior editor at large Pattie Sellers has written some of Fortune's most talked-about cover stories, including "Marissa Mayer: Ready to Rumble at Yahoo," "Oprah's Next Act," "Can Meg Whitman Save California?" "The $100 Billion Woman" (Melinda Gates), and "Remodeling Martha" (Martha Stewart). She has helped oversee Fortune's "Most Powerful Women in Business" package every year since its launch in 1998. Pattie is Executive Director of the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, the preeminent gathering of women leaders in business and beyond. She oversees MPW programs that enable women leaders to extend their influence and empower the next generation—such as Fortune MPW Entrepreneurs and the Fortune-U.S. State Department Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership. Beyond her Fortune duties, she is also developing Live Content across Time Inc. Pattie grew up in Allentown, PA, graduated from the University of Virginia, and started at Fortune in 1984. Her blog, Postcards, is about how power players lead, manage others, and navigate their careers.
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