Eileen Burbidge: From Chicago to the Queen of British VC

I assumed I was going to be in Silicon Valley for the rest of my life. At the time, yeah, the idea was this is where I'll be, but it would be really useful now perhaps to get some international experience on the CV or on the resume. That was the idea. So just for one or two years and then be back.

It's true. Yeah. Nobody had heard of it. Everyone was calling it Skypy. Yeah. It was brand new. We hadn't launched. So, I didn't actually think of it as a big risk. I think I thought about the cost of flying myself out, finding a place to live. But worst case scenario, even if I had to just come back in 2 weeks, 2 months, 2 years, I was always going to have, you know, money to live on, I guess, or I would come back and get another job. Even if it was a company that wasn't my first choice, I did see it as adventure. I almost saw it as like a paid vacation.

No, thank you for having me.

It's a really, really great title to have, but you actually grew up in Chicago. Yes. So I was born and raised in the US and I've been now in London for 22 years. But I think yeah, Fortune magazine, that journalist was really very kind. I think that was more than 10 years ago now. So it was a much earlier, more nascent, less mature ecosystem here.

Well, that's really really kind of you. And I think most people today may not even remember that title because it was like I said more than 10 years ago. So it was sort of when I think the ecosystem, the startup ecosystem and venture ecosystem here in the UK was first coming into its own. And I think now we've got, you know, one thing that's really exciting about being an investor right is that we have a subsequent generation or two of founders, of entrepreneurs, and of course investors. So I think that just means I'm old and I'm old school.

Yeah, I think about it a lot because I'm obviously really grateful to my parents. They were first generation Chinese immigrants who had come over from China for their advanced degrees and they settled in the Midwest. And you know, I'm lucky on so many levels, but really grateful for, you know, what they instilled in me, which was a really hard work ethic, how important education was, how important different experiences were, and also just to keep on pushing and to make sure that aside from anybody else around us that we could always rely on ourselves and to be self-reliant, therefore. So, I think that was always a great push. And then the other thing I should be grateful for, although at the time I was a little bit resentful, was I didn't actually think coming out of secondary school or high school that I wanted to be an engineer. But with East Asian parents, immigrant parents, I didn't really have too many options. So I was basically told, they were supportive and they said you can do whatever you want with your life and your career but before you do that, before you embark on whatever your passion might be or your calling, get a degree and have a university degree that's either engineering, law, or medicine.

So of the three I went okay well I'll go for engineering because frankly it's the shortest curriculum in the US because law school is so many more years, medical school is so many more years, so engineering four-year degree in the US. And at the time, this is going to, I mean this is a long time ago now but computer science within the engineering department at Illinois, which is a fantastic program now but it was perceived to be the easiest engineering program at Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. So that's why I did computer science. I was lucky enough to be, you know, decent in math and science and in STEM subjects. So, I did that, but I had no idea what I wanted to do. So, I do have my parents to thank for pushing me into choosing that because obviously it was then the foundation for everything else I did.

When I was a kid, I actually thought it would be very cool. I don't know that I thought I wanted to do it, but I thought it would be very cool to be the first female president of the United States. That's what I thought.

It is right. That's what I thought when I was even before being a teenager. So, no, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I actually enjoyed observing and watching people. So, I thought maybe I would want to pursue a psychology degree at university. But that's when the conversations with my parents happened which was listen you can be a psychologist later in life if you want to but get the degree to be engineering, legal, or medicine.

You could get it later that can be your secondary thing once you've got the foundation. And then I was just lucky because coming out of university I worked for a telecoms company first thinking about doing something with technology but actually working with people. And that telecoms company actually had a management program basically or a new grad scheme which put new grads into three different locations across the US for 6 months at a time. So it was a classic new grad scheme and that is what first took me to the San Francisco Bay area.

So in 1993 or maybe it was early '94 I was relocated to the East Bay. So, Pleasanton and that's when I got introduced to what then you know became known as Silicon Valley. I don't even think I called it that at that time.

10 years. 10 years.

Exactly. Right. So, I was there for most of the boom. I mean, maybe I missed the first year of it, but most of the dot boom and also what I think is much more valuable where the last couple of years I was there was after the bust. And honestly, I think I learned more during the bust than I did during the boom. Because in the boom, everybody's lucky. Everyone's doing well. And you don't necessarily need that much discernment, I don't think. But in the bust, you still need a lot of luck and it's not enough to just work hard or be in the right place at the right time. And so I thought that was really really interesting to observe.

So I was in the Bay Area and I left the telecoms company, joined Apple, then went to Sun which is now part of Oracle, joined an incubator in 1999. So this is all very cliche San Francisco Bay area. Joined a company that went public in 1999. Yeah. So yeah I did that. I didn't do Yahoo until I was here in London after Skype. Yeah, that's true.

Yeah. Honestly, I assumed I was going to be in Silicon Valley for the rest of my life. I thought I would live in the San Francisco Bay area forever. I loved everything about the ecosystem. I loved the technology sector. I loved that everyone you run into was somehow related to that as well. Loved having those conversations, loved the social scene, loved the, you know, the range of activities from skiing in Tahoe on the weekends to being right next to the ocean, the climate, all of it. And I still actually have a house in San Francisco. I never sold it cuz I thought I was going to come back. So, I have a tenancy in common or a part of a house in San Francisco. So at the time the idea was this is where I'll be but it would be really useful now perhaps to get some international experience on the CV or on the resume. That was the idea. So just for one or two years and then be back. And I didn't sell my car, didn't sell the house, you know, thought it was just going to be a year or two.

And I had an inkling that maybe the Bay Area was a little too insular. Because the last role I had before I moved was working at a company called Palm Source, which was working on personal digital assistants. Again, this is how old I am now basically in every smartphone, but we had an operating system that we licensed to hardware manufacturers. And we had as licensees Samsung, Nokia and the like. And I remember that it was really difficult to get resource, bug fixes, attention on some of our licensees like Samsung and Nokia, number two, number three handset manufacturers in the world at that time in you know over and above maybe Silicon Valley partners. So it did feel as if we were in a bit of a bubble and I did think it would be really useful to get the international experience, come out of the Silicon Valley bubble and then bring that back to the Bay Area. That was my thinking at the time. Yeah. And then you know you can never predict what's going to happen.

I think what's more instrumental is that my parents really really filled me with empowerment, self-confidence and because they ensured or made sure that I would have a degree that I could always fall back on. So even if I became the psychologist or even if I you know in their eyes if I pursued a path of music or artistry or something that was not a sort of a 9-to-five job type of thing their whole premise was have this safety net so you can always get a job even if you don't enjoy it that's going to give you a paycheck. And I do think then understanding that I had that safety net or that risk mitigation means that I was more willing to take on risk because I had mitigation in place. So I think that's the mindset which is after thinking about worst case scenarios and how to make sure there's a safety net then you can think about well what's the worst that's going to happen. Why not go to London you know and I did think about where I might go I remember considering Amsterdam or London only because of English speaking sort of cities. And but then thinking what's the worst that's going to happen you know I go there for 12 months come back but I'll have some more experience that brings into maybe I even come into the exact same job that I left, different company, same company, whatever it might be. But I'll just bring on so many more experiences. So, it was just a cost-benefit analysis, right? What's the greatest cost that can come out of this or the biggest risk, but what's the benefit? What's to be gained? And so, I do think it must be maybe part of obviously them being immigrants and then also instilling in me the other values that all led to it. But I do think it is that sense that even today I think listen if you know everyone talks about whether or not in a bubble whether there's going to be an absolute reset maybe there won't be any careers left in venture maybe there won't be anything in startups I still believe I can you know I'll work as a wait staff in a restaurant I don't mind that you know I don't it's I will be able to find work to make sure that I can pay my bills pay for my children whatever I need to do I don't think I'm necessarily too proud for that and I feel like I will be able to find my means. So if that's the case and I have that confidence in myself to find that then why not try things? Why not test things as I go?

I'm sure watching them because obviously I saw them as very successful and having achieved what they wanted which was you know middle class family upbringing suburban Chicago and so having achieved that for themselves understanding and hearing what they'd gone through to do that being the respective mother and father. There were lessons in there which was hard work you know be willing to work for what you want think about your financial security but you know rely on yourself to do that but also don't be afraid to take chances to look further abroad absolutely. I feel like I also have this pull or maybe as I hear myself speak that I wasn't necessarily satisfied. I don't know that that's the case. I just because I'm actually quite a content person. I feel really lucky. I've always felt really privileged and lucky and I'm mindful of that. But I think I also feel like there's so much more to learn and so much more to experience. So why stop?

I think it's definitely all experience. It's really interesting because I got invited to participate on another type of podcast or program where the conversation was about failures or fails and I didn't have a problem admitting if I'd had failures. I had a real problem trying to come up with examples because even when I think about things that I've, you know, been annoyed, been upset, been disappointed, or didn't go the way I thought they should go or wanted them to go, I still realized I didn't think of them as failures because I felt they were just iterations or they were just getting me to somewhere else. So, I do think of life as a series of experiences or just a holistic set of experiences. I don't think of them as success or failures. I don't keep score that way. But I also think there's been a difference from before I had children to now having children. So before I had children, absolutely. It was about experiences. Just racking up as much as I could experience. Never saying no. Saying yes to everything, go here, go there, try that, try this. That was always something I wanted to do. Now that I've children, I think it's slightly shifted where I still believe in that ethos, but I want that for my children more than maybe myself. So it's a little bit less selfish or more selfless. And so therefore it is about securing their future so that they can do that or enabling that they'll have the same privilege that I did.

It's true. Nobody heard of it. Everyone is calling it Skypy. Yeah. Yeah. It was brand new. We hadn't launched. Yeah. And you know even when you say that now I honestly this again this is the privilege that I had thanks to my parents my family the education the degree you know I had jobs in the Bay Area I mentioned I had a home or at least a mortgage so I didn't actually think of it as a big risk I think I thought about the cost of flying myself out finding a place to live but worst case scenario I don't know even if it's something even if I had to just come back in 2 weeks 2 months 2 years I didn't think there was a risk because I didn't mortgage my house. I was always going to have, you know, money to live on, I guess, or I would come back and get another job. Even if it was a company that wasn't my first choice, I knew I could go back to the Bay Area and be a product manager, a business development man. I would find a job even if I thought it was unsexy, uninteresting to make sure that I could build up again financial capacity again. So, I didn't really see it as a risk. I did see it as adventure. I almost saw it as like a paid vacation, paid holiday. Like I'll get a chance to go to another country. I'll get paid. I'll get paid to live in London. Exactly. Travel to Estonia once in a while because that's where the technical team was. That was a big part of my decision honestly in taking the role because I actually had two offers. I had the offer from Skype and an offer from Shazam at the time. And Shazam was really interesting because I do think the way you were thinking about it that would have been less risky. They'd been in business for much longer. They had a Palo Alto office. They had IP and a joint venture with Philips, I remember. So, it was more stable. Would have given me excuses to travel back home at the time. But I ended up choosing Skype because I thought, well, I want chances to go to Estonia, you know. I want So, but yeah, I did think it was just a luxury to be able to work abroad.

And I think the idea since the idea was well, I'm going to come back. It wasn't quite like what my parents did for themselves, which was making a life for themselves in the US and maybe thinking about family. And for me, my horizon was only a year or two. So, what's the worst that can happen in a year or two? You know, how much damage could I do?

Exactly. You know, I didn't have children and I think, yeah, if I had little ones, I might not have taken that decision, right? But it was just me. It was my ex-husband at the time. I mean husband at the time now ex-husband and so we thought why wouldn't we yeah.

Then I met my another ex-husband and so we started a family and that's when I started having children yeah.

I was only in Skype for about a year so I left before the sale to eBay. But yeah it was just about a year and then that's when I got pregnant started the family and that's when I went to Yahoo.