S. Somasegar

S. Somasegar
Residence Seattle, Washington, U.S.
Occupation Managing Director at Seattle’s Madrona Venture Group
Website Corporate Bio, Twitter

S. “Soma” Somasegar is an Indian American technology business executive in the Greater Seattle Area. Soma is currently a Managing Director at Madrona Venture Group, a venture capital firm based in Seattle.[1] Soma joined Madrona in November 2015 after a 27-year career at Microsoft, where he most recently was Corporate Vice President of the Developer Division and overseeing the global distributed R&D centers at Microsoft.[2]

Early life

Soma was born on August 1966 and grew up in Pondicherry, India with his parents and a sibling.[3]

Soma attended Petit Seminaire Higher Secondary School in Pondicherry. In 1986 Soma received a Bachelor's degree in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Guindy Engineering College, Anna University in Chennai, India. Soma then moved to the US where he received a Master's degree in Computer Engineering from Louisiana State University in 1988. He was working toward a PhD in Computer Engineering from the State University of New York at Buffalo when he joined Microsoft in January 1989.[3][4][5][6]

Soma later received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Anna University, for accomplishments in the fields of Technology and Computer Science (November 2006).[7] He was also presented with the Asian American Engineer of the Year Award (February 2008).[8]

Career

Microsoft

Soma joined Microsoft Corporation in January 1989 as a Software Design Engineer and had a long career spanning almost 27 years as he grew through the ranks to be a Senior Vice President at Microsoft.[9]

Soma joined the Operating System group at Microsoft, working on OS/2, the early versions of NT and Windows – in all eight different releases of the Windows family of product.[9]

As the leader of Developer Division, Soma was responsible for engineering, marketing and evangelizing developer tools and services, programming languages and runtimes designed for a broad base of software developers and development teams, including the Visual Studio family of products, .NET Framework, and Team Foundation Server. His team was also responsible for MSDN and TechNet online properties to enable a deep connection with the developer and IT professional audiences.[10] In addition, Somasegar was also the founder of Microsoft’s India R&D efforts as well as the executive sponsor for Microsoft’s global development centers including the R&D efforts in China, India and Israel.[9]

Under Soma’s leadership, the Microsoft Developer Division, which supports over six million .NET developers worldwide, expanded its mission to deliver developer tools and services for mobile development and cloud development across a variety of platforms and programming technologies through the Visual Studio and .NET family of products.[9]

Madrona Venture Group

Soma joined Madrona Venture Group in November 2015.[11] Madrona Venture Group is a venture capital firm based in Seattle, investing primarily in early-stage Pacific Northwest technology companies.

As a Managing Director at Madrona, Soma focuses on key investment areas including Machine Learning/Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Reality/Augmented Reality, next generation cloud infrastructure and intelligent applications.[12] Soma has authored several articles outlining Madrona’s perspective on how these technologies will evolve.[13][14][15]

Soma is passionate about working the next generation of start-ups and entrepreneurs to help them build and scale successful businesses and sees a tremendous amount of potential and opportunity for the Pacific Northwest to be a great start-up and innovation ecosystem.

Personal life

Soma lives in the Seattle area with his wife Akila. Soma and Akila have two daughters.[16]

Soma has been an active angel and seed investor both in the U.S. and globally. With investments spanning across both enterprise and consumer segments, Soma has focused on early stage investments across a wide range of technology areas.[2] This is what led him to become a venture capitalist in the second phase of his career.

An area of passion and focus for Soma is empowering and educating girls around the world. Soma and his wife, having two daughters themselves, believe in the great opportunity that exists globally in supporting women’s education and empowerment initiatives.[12]

In his spare time, Soma enjoys traveling to different parts of the world, and occasionally playing a round of racquetball on the weekends.[12]

References

[11]

  1. ↑ "Madrona Venture Group Names S. Somasegar Managing Director". VentureBeat. January 12, 2017.
  2. 1 2 "S. Somasegar Joins Madrona Venture Group as Venture Partner". VentureBeat. November 18, 2015.
  3. 1 2 Josey Puliyenthuruthel (April 19, 2008). "S. Somasegar: Breathing easy in the fast lane". LiveMint.com. HT Media.
  4. ↑ "Dr. S. Somasegar is a technology guru at Microsoft". Diversity/Careers. June–July 2008.
  5. ↑ "S. Somasegar". The Times of India.
  6. ↑ "Interview with S Somasegar, Corporate VP, Microsoft Corp". November 9, 2006.
  7. ↑ "Honorary Doctorate Speechless!". The Smart Techie. December 2006.
  8. ↑ "2008 Engineers Week: Asian American Engineer of the Year Awards". Chinese Institute of Engineers – USA. January 7, 2008.
  9. 1 2 3 4 "Microsoft Corporate Bio". June 8, 2010.
  10. ↑ Darryl K. Taft (2005-01-31). "The Importance of Microsoft Being Transparent". eWeek.
  11. 1 2 Ex-Microsoft exec Soma Somasegar now at Madrona "SeattleTimes" 18 Nov 2015
  12. 1 2 3 "Madrona Venture Group Bio".
  13. ↑ "The intelligent app ecosystem (is more than just bots!)". TechCrunch. May 24, 2016.
  14. ↑ "Every company is a technology company, but most don't behave like one". TechCrunch. November 29, 2016.
  15. ↑ "Technology trends changing the world as we look ahead (slideshow)". TechCrunch. January 1, 2017.
  16. ↑ Stephen Ibaraki (June 9, 2006). "Interview with Microsoft's S. "Soma" Somasegar". InformIT.
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