Connie Loizos

That was quick. The former CEO of venture-backed Entellium, Paul Johnston, pleaded guilty today to one count of wire fraud under an agreement with federal prosecutors  who are planning to drop all other allegations against him. Under the terms of the agreement, Johnston is looking at between a four- and five-year prison term and will likely […]

One-year old startup Milo is closing in on a $1.1 million seed round, with the help of Youniversity Ventures, according to a regulatory filing. Youniversity — which mentors students and first-time entrepreneurs and hooks them up with capital sources — is the group formed by YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim, Eventbrite co-founder Kevin Hartz and Keith […]

Thanks to Portfolio for pointing out an incredible story about IBM’s largest individual shareholder, the inconspicuous director of a funeral parlor in Binghamton, New York, who died recently at age 90 after leading a happily frugal life with his recently deceased wife. Evidently, the mother of the man, Robert McDevitt, was secretary to the president of the precursor to IBM in the early 1900s. When she died, she passed her shares along to her son. Now, an inventory of his property suggests he was sitting on $250 million -- nearly all of which he willed away to schools and organizations dear to his heart. Georgetown University, McDevitt’s alma mater and the nation’s oldest Catholic and Jesuit university, is getting the lion’s share of his estate. He bequested $75 million to the school, its biggest gift ever. He also left a big chunk to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse, including

Gurbaksh Chahal, the 26-year-old founder of ad network BlueLithium and, more recently, the e-commerce startup gWallet, stars tonight in the season premier of Fox's "Secret Millionaire." Here's the premise: Each week, a supremely wealthy someone is dropped into a poor, crime-infested neighborhood for a week. Going in undercover, his or her job is to meet as many people as possible and, hopefully, be lastingly transformed by them. As I've said before, it's exceedingly easy to mock “G” as Chahal refers to himself. Chahal, who sold BlueLithium to Yahoo last year for $300 million, is ostentatious, from his white Bentley to his $7 million gold-appointed San Francisco penthouse that he calls the "G Spot" to the um, immodest, picture featured here, which was up at his Website for a time. I'm reluctant to judge. I've only met him once briefly before, and he seemed nice (and surprisingly unassuming).

Here’s the second part of my conversation with Dick Strayer, a Los Gatos, Calif., psychologist, has been helping venture capital firms and their startups sort out their emotional and structural kinks for the last 26 years. (Part one is here.) In this installment, Strayer talks about the “one fund lag” in bringing aboard the right […]

Look in the dictionary under “serial CEO” and you might well see a picture of Ken Ross staring back at you. Ross has been CEO of six companies in his career, including content manager Documentum, business-to-business startup Extricity, and Pillar Corporation, which developed enterprise budget and forecasting software. (All were acquired.) Maybe it’s not so […]

“I just figured out that I spend more than three hours every year untangling my iPod earphones.” — A Bay Area VC who asked not to have his name attached to his very funny (and relatable) observation today.

Dick Strayer, a Los Gatos, Calif., psychologist, has been helping venture capital firms and their startups sort out their emotional and structural kinks for the last 26 years. Strayer’s expertise doesn’t come cheap. Businesses pay his consulting firm between $50,000 and $75,000 for what is typically a four-month-long engagement, wherein teams are assessed, strategies are reevaluated, […]

Talk about an unexpected twist. Terry Drayton, a well-known Seattle entrepreneur who has founded companies like HomeGrocer.com (acquired by WebVan), is being accused of ripping off a soccer club, a Little League team and a ski organization. But that may be just the beginning of his troubles. Drayton’s Count Me In, a Bellevue company whose online registration tools are used by thousands of nonprofits and youth programs across the country, apparently hasn't been passing along a percentage of those fees.

Last Friday, I caught up with Bob Ackerman, who co-founded early-stage venture firm Allegis Capital back in 1995. Allegis is a low-flying operation that has enjoyed a few exits in recent years, including IronPort Systems, which raised $94 million and sold to Cisco for $830 million, and the telephony software company Ribbit, which raised $23 million before selling to British Telecom in July for $105 million. Ackerman himself is no shrinking violet, however, and he's certainly not shy when discussing his views on the industry. Here’s part of our conversation: You position yourself as a “value investor.” Are you in the middle of a shopping binge? We’ll seize on depressed valuations, definitely. What’s interesting this time around