Word: valleys
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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After creating one of the Net's top brands, a company with a market value of some $20 billion, Pierre Omidyar hit the delete key. Months before eBay's IPO--the traditional media coronation for a Silicon Valley wunderkind--he stepped aside in favor of onetime Hasbro exec Meg Whitman. "I've obviously tried to push her to the forefront," he says. "Meg's the public face of the company." Omidyar moved to France in part to get in touch with his roots--he was born in Paris and lived there until he was six. But he's also working...
...herding's biggest draw is undoubtedly the dogs. "If one of our dogs fell in a river, we'd jump in and save it," says Ted Ondrak, who runs the San Fernando Valley Herding Association with his wife Janna. The Ondraks are professional trainers and breeders, but their clients--movie stars and sales analysts, attorneys and seismologists--tend to feel the same way. Most get hooked on herding after buying a dog that needs a job. "Border collies are incredibly smart, but they get psychotic if they don't have work," says Lilliam Cummings, 42, whose two dogs devoured carpets...
...Spirits--and pretension--flowed freely. Decorative candles flickered. Fine Napa Valley wine was served, as was some cranberry concoction with lots of vodka. We began our meal with a salad-tossed wild greens bathed in a house vinaigrette. Next, fresh pasta in marinara. After dining, we absconded to our reserved booth at the newly opened Temple Bar. It was an Upper East Side dream come true...
Always the outsider, Son didn't have much of a Silicon Valley Rolodex in 1995, when he returned to the States. But he did have nearly a billion dollars to spend, money practically handed to him by Japanese bankers desperate to breathe life into their country's sagging economy. Son lured a couple of Silicon Valley veterans to run Softbank Technology Ventures, the San Jose partnership that has become the heart of his Internet empire. And so the shopping spree began, as Softbank scooped up the trade-show group that organizes Comdex, the computer industry's biggest convention, and Kingston...
Since then, it is as if Son & Co. trained a fire hose on Silicon Valley and pumped in a steady stream of cash. President Gary Rieschel figures that in 1996, with Softbank Technology Ventures still an unknown in the valley, it invested $200 million in 55 companies in four months-- although "investing" hardly describes the act of writing checks as fast as you can. Last month Softbank opened Hotbank, an incubator for start-ups. There has been no need to advertise. Each week hundreds of applications pour into Hotbank; out come announcements of new Softbank allies: PeoplePC, Webvan, Global Sports...