On Tuesday morning at PC Forum, the kickoff session was Esther Dyson’s interview with Bill Joy, one of the legendary founders of Sun Microsystems and longtime CTO there. “Big Swings at Big Problems” is how the session was advertised. Esther said the last time Bill spoke at PC Forum was 1995, and she 
wore the sweatshirt from that event in honor of the occasion. A lot has certainly changed in those 11 years, for Sun and everyone else. In recent years, Bill made the move to VC-land and joined Kleiner Perkins — where his former Sun colleague, Vinod Khosla, has been a partner for many years.
Bill said there are still 15 years left on Moore’s Law, and that the smaller devices that will result from these contunuing technology advancements “will enable many more people to have computers and get educated — if they can figure out how to get courseware on those things.”
But what else is Bill focusing on at KP these days? “We’re looking for innovators who can get more clean water and better energy — and get everyone driving efficient cars. And I mean electric cars, not just hybrids.” [Just an aside: Bill, please call me when the torque on those things equals that of my Turbo Passat, would ya?]
Asked about recent investments KP is making, Joy said “it’s a wonderful time to be working with innovators.” One example, he said, is a still-stealth company KP has backed that’s “putting everything needed for a cheap (computing) device onto one chip.” And [yawn] they also recently did two public company investments (PIPEs). “How much is KP leaving the Valley behind?” asked Esther. “We’ve always had a life sciences group. We still have an IT group, including green tech. Vinod just announced a new fund yesterday. He’s a big ethanol advocate. And I’m working with him on biofuels initiatives.”
Joy continued: “Nanoscale technology is driving the development of new materials. The breadth of proposals is very wide these days. The great stuff always sounds like quakery. I get all those.” Bill also said that a lot of what’s happening today reminds him of 1999, except “there are bigger opportunities worldwide.”
Why haven’t there been many of these new investments yet by KP? “We’ve been looking to invest in a water technology,” Joy said, implying he and his partners just haven’t seen a good candidate yet. “We need ones with little or no maintenance.” For example, no filters to change, he said. “Clean water is the best enabler of good health (in the third world). And electricity is an enabler of many things.”
What about the “laptop for every child” program? asked an audience member. “I’d like to see a ten-dollar computer,” Joy said, “with a roll-up display.”
Esther’s closing comment was, “Bill, you were so gloomy five years ago…” (referring to his now infamous Wired article, “The Future Doesn’t Need Us,” a line of thinking he’s since moved away from). “You just have to keep your eyes on what needs to be done,” Joy said. “It’s an incredibly exciting time.”
Leave a Reply