Another seen by our reporter, Liwen-Edison Fu, as Global Corporate Venturing researches for the next Powerlist 100 awards is the move by Rajesh Swaminathan, formerly head of Applied Ventures (AV), the corporate venture capital arm of semiconductor manufacturing technology provider Applied Materials (Amat), to join venture capital firm Khosla Ventures.
Global Corporate Venturing selected Swaminathan as a Rising Star in 2017 and he ascended to lead AV and so was in GCV’s Powerlist in 2019.
But the move from CVC to VC has gone against trends seen by compensation data provider J Thelander Consulting’s latest survey published by Pitchbook, which showed “only 3% of VCs” made a hire from a CVC firm last year—more often targeting investment banks, private equity and growth firms and private companies for talent.
By contrast, J Thelander’s survey identified 46% of corporate venture firms that made an outside hire last year from a traditional VC firm – the most popular source.
Swaminathan himself had been a VC before joining Applied Ventures in 2009 when it was less fashionable to do so, so just as with his dealmaking he might be ahead of the curve again.
