John William “Bill” Gurley is an American entrepreneur, investor, and venture capitalist. Bill Gurley is famous for being one of the general partners of Benchmark, a highly-successful Silicon Valley venture capital company located in Menlo Park, California.
Gurley’s involvement with Benchmark has landed him on the ‘Forbes Midas List.’ He’s widely considered one of the top investors in the global technology industry.
In addition to his reputation as a tech investor, Bill Gurley is also a blogger in his own right. Gurley blogs both on third-party websites and his social media accounts. His blogs mainly tackle business, investment, and personal finance.
Bill Gurley Quick Facts
| Full Name: | John William Gurley |
| Popular Name: | Bill Gurley |
| Nicknames: | N/A |
| Birth Date: | May 10, 1966 |
| Age: | 56 years |
| Parents: | Unknown |
| Siblings: | Unknown |
| Birth Place: | Dickinson, Texas, United States |
| Nationality: | American |
| Ethnicity: | White |
| Religion: | Unknown |
| Education: | The University of Florida and McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas |
| Marital Status: | Married to Amy Gurley |
| Sexual Orientation: | Straight |
| Children: | 3, identities unknown |
| Net Worth: | USD 8 billion |
| Source of Wealth: | Entrepreneurship and Other Ventures |
| Height: | 6′ 9″ (2.05 m) |
| Weight: | In kilograms: 74 kg; In pounds: 165 lbs. |
Early Life and Career Information
Early Life
John William “Bill” Gurley was born on May 10, 1966, in Dickinson, Texas, United States.
Gurley hasn’t revealed the identity of his parents besides stating in a previous interview that his father worked in NASA’s space program. Not much is known either on the identity of his siblings (if he ever had any).
Bill’s early academic background is also unknown. But after presumably completing his high school education, Gurley pursued a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Florida, graduating in 1989. He later graduated with a Master’s of Business Administration degree from the University of Texas’ McCombs School of Business in 1993.
Career Beginnings
After graduating from the university, Bill Gurley began his professional career as a member of the technical marketing group in the embedded processor division of Advanced Micro Devices.
Gurley then became a design engineer for Compaq Computer. He’s noted for being part of the team that designed Compaq products like the 486/50. He was also widely involved in creating the company’s first multi-processor server.
Bill Gurley’s next assignment was as a research analyst on Wall Street. He served in this capacity for four years, three of which he spent at CS First Boston. During his tenure as a Wall Street research analyst, Gurley covered various renowned tech giants like Compaq, Microsoft, Dell, and Amazon.com.
Investment Career
Bill Gurley launched his career as a venture capitalist by becoming a partner at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners. He later became involved with Benchmark, which he’s still associated with to date.
Benchmark is a San Francisco-based venture capital firm that provides seed capital to startups. The company was founded in 1995 by Bob Kagle, Andy Rachleff, Kevin Harvey, Bruce Dunlevie, and Val Vaden.
Gurley joined Benchmark as a general partner, a position he has maintained to date. He shares that status with five other investors, including Matt Cohler, Peter Fenton, Mitch Lasky, Eric Vishria, Chetan Puttagunta, and Sarah Tavel.
During his stint as a Benchmark partner, Gurley has overseen investments in numerous startups. The most notable ones are eBay, Uber, and Twitter. Others include;
• Brighter
• Zuora
• Linden Lab
• Yelp
• Vessel
• SnapChat
• DogVacay
• Optimizely
• Zillow
• AOL
• Scale Computing
• DropBox
• LiveOps
• Cockroach Labs
• Good Eggs
• Discord
• Stitch Fix
• GrubHug
• Instagram
• OpenTable
• Friendstar
• Nextdoor
• Art.com
• HackerOne
• Sailthru
Bill Gurley’s Net Worth
As at November 1, 2022, Bill Gurley had a net worth of $8 billion. The vast majority of Gurley’s billions came from his involvement with Benchmark, particularly the company’s investment in Uber.
In a past interview, Bill Gurley stated that he became a billionaire when he (through Benchmark) invested $12 million in Uber in 2011. The ride-sharing company is currently valued at over $50 billion, which means that Gurley’s seed investment must have generated exponential profits.
In addition to Benchmark, Bill Gurley’s income also comes from personal investments in the cryptocurrency industry. The venture capitalist is associated with the cryptocurrency platform Ethereum.
Lessons from Bill Gurley
1. You’re never too smart to learn new tricks
Bill Gurley has always underscored the significance of learning as a continuous process. He opines that no one is ever too smart, wealthy, or experienced to learn a new success trick.
2. Work hard like your life depends on it…because it certainly does
Gurley‘s industriousness is unmistakable. His strong work ethic explains why he has served as a Benchmark general partner for years. Besides, he actively pursues other income-generating activities while discharging his roles at Benchmark.
3. Invest in the future
Through Bill Gurley’s influence, Benchmark has been able to invest in many future successful ventures. These include startups like Twitter whose future looked bleak at some point.
Famous Quotes by Bill Gurley
• I think one of the key differentiators I bring to the table as a venture capitalist is a solid understanding of the public markets and how they operate.
• Marketing executives like big budgets, as big budgets make it easier to grow the top line.
• Over the past 10 years, the majority of value creation in the venture community has been in consumer Internet.
• Venture capital is unscalable. Production equals the time each partner has.
• You can’t make money with a consensus accurate prediction.
Wrap Up
Bill Gurley is a respectable name in the global tech investment sector. Gurley has a stunning net worth of $8 billion, the bulk of which came from his involvement with Benchmark.
