Mike Volpi is no stranger to Index Ventures, the venture capital firm he is joining as a partner in the London office, where he will lead early-stage investments in the Internet, telecom/networking and media sectors and contribute to the firm's later-stage growth fund.
"Mike has been a close adviser to the Index family for more than 10 years," says Giuseppe Zocco, partner and co-founder, Index Ventures. "He has worked closely with several of our portfolio companies such as Skype, TrialPay, Joost, FON and Telegent, even serving on some of their boards, so it's a natural progression to have him officially join our team."
Actually Volpi has been more than an adviser to Index; he's also been an investor. According to tech blogger Kara Swisher, who interviewed Volpi on Monday, he invested $10 million in Index's first fund, back when he was the head of M&A at Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO), a job he held for 13 years, during which time he spearheaded the acquisitions of 75-plus companies.
In the interview with Swisher, Volpi's most interesting comments are about his most recent job as CEO of Joost Operations SA, a company that Index co-led a $45 million round in two years ago, just before Volpi joined the Internet TV startup. Volpi had met Joost founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennström when he served on the board of their previous startup, Skype Technologies SA, which is currently being spun off from eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY). He continues today as chairman of Joost.
According to Swisher, in order for Joost to compete with other online video entities -- including Google Inc.'s (NASDAQ:GOOG) YouTube and Hulu, a joint venture of News Corp. (NASDAQ:NWS) and General Electric Co.'s (NYSE:GE) NBC Universal -- it needed more funding. "And, since no online video service was making money, he said it was decided a change was needed instead of just keeping on the same path," blogs Swisher.
"It is better to be competing in a sector that has profitable rivals than one that does not," Volpi says of Joost's new strategy to provide white-label video services to other online video providers.
The M&A pro blamed pricing issues on why he failed to find a buyer for Joost but said the discussions with potential acquirers led to the white-label strategy.
"Not everyone wanted to pay a lot to own Joost, but a lot of people wanted to rent it," said Volpi. - Mary Kathleen Flynn
