Jess Lee (businesswoman)
American venture capitalist
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jess Lee (born 1982) is an American venture capitalist. She is a partner at Sequoia Capital[1] and the former chief executive officer of Polyvore, which she joined as co-founder and first employee.[2][3]
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Early life
Lee lived in Hong Kong until the age of 17, when she graduated from Hong Kong International School, then moved to California to pursue a bachelor's degree in computer science at Stanford University,[4] though she had initially been interested in attending art school.[5]
Career
In 2004, Lee was recruited into Google's associate product manager (APM) program,[4][6] which had been founded and was then still led by Marissa Mayer.[7] Lee started work on Google's shopping engine Froogle[6] before becoming product manager of Google Maps.[4] There she worked with a team of five engineers to create My Maps, a project that allowed users to create maps of their own.[6]
She joined Polyvore as a product manager in 2008 after providing co-founder Pasha Sadri with feedback on issues with the website.[8] Lee initially wrote code for Polyvore but later started to handle social media, hiring, and finding new locations for the office.[4] Her role expanded to honorary co-founder in 2010 and she was promoted to CEO in 2012.[6] Lee then guided the company to cut down on features such as the "Ask" section and opened another office in New York City.[6]
In 2016, she joined Sequoia Capital as an investing partner,[9] becoming its first female partner in the United States in 44 years of operation.[10] Hired at age 33, Lee became one of Sequoia's youngest partners.[11]
Personal life
She currently resides in Mountain View, California.[4]