UC Commits $250 Million To New Fund Led By Sacramento Tech, Sports Entrepreneur

Sacramento Kings owner and high-tech entrepreneur Vivek Ranadivé will lead the University of California’s new $250 million investment fund, UC said Tuesday morning.

As reported earlier this month, the fund is designed to support innovative research at the multi-campus university system.

Vivek Ranadive, software entrepreneur and owner of the Sacramento Kings NBA franchise, will help the University of California system invest more than $250 million in innovations discovered by university researchers.

The system currently fosters innovation through 30 incubators and accelerators statewide, and has helped spawn more than 800 startups with UC patents since 1980, officials said. With the new funding, UC President Janet Napolitano and other top leaders obviously expect innovative research to continue its recent surge.

UC’s Office of the Chief Investment Officer, also known as UC Investments, will be the anchor investor in the fund, with its $250 million commitment, but the university system wants Ranadivé and his team to attract outside investors to join the ambitious project.

Chief Investment Officer Jagdeep Singh Bachher leads the initiative from inside the system, which includes 10 campuses, five medical centers and three affiliated national laboratories. Locally, that includes UC Berkeley, UC San Francisco, UC Davis, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, and Lawrence Livermore National Lab.

The University of California Board of Regents approved the concept in September 2014, officials said. Plans call for the new fund to invest in innovations deriving from UC research in life sciences, technology, energy, agriculture and materials, “using no tuition or state funding,” the system pledged.

“Vivek is a leader who can make (the huge project’s goals) happen,” Janet Napolitano, UC’s president, said in a statement.

Ranadivé founded Teknekron Software Solutions, a digital stock trading company, and TIBCO, a communications technology firm with clients worldwide. He is also the owner and chairman of the Sacramento Kings NBA basketball franchise.

“As an entrepreneur, I look forward to supporting fellow entrepreneurs” and helping new startups make a difference in the world, he said in the UC statement.

UC’s constituent universities have 246,000 students, more than 200,000 faculty and staffers, and 1.7 million alumni.

Source: San Francisco Business Times, Chris Rauber
Photo: Vivek Ranadive, software entrepreneur and owner of the Sacramento Kings NBA franchise,